


Evil Author Day 2018

by Eff_Dragonkiller



Category: Marvel, NCIS, Stargate SG-1
Genre: Fantastic Racism, Gen, Magic, Mythical Beings & Creatures, Organized Crime, Period-Typical Racism, Prostitution, Racism, Undercover Missions, suspend your disbelief
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-02-15
Updated: 2018-02-15
Packaged: 2019-03-19 01:45:37
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 2
Words: 23,957
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13694295
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Eff_Dragonkiller/pseuds/Eff_Dragonkiller
Summary: In honor of International Fanworks Day/Week, some works in progress for your enjoyment.-God & Country-Tony DiNozzo was the best undercover operative in D.C. Of course, he was going to get tapped for an undercover mission in a base under NORAD where he gets to play Marine. Of course. That's just the way his life goes.-Bloody Streets-Steve and Bucky inadvertently start a gang with all the magical beings in Brooklyn that don't fit anywhere else. All they really wanted to do was tell the Mob to get off their territory.





	1. God & Country

Tony slipped his gun and badge into his waist band and his shoes on his feet. Nothing, absolutely nothing good ever came from someone knocking on his door after midnight. The majority of his nightmares were the result of his work at NCIS. Major Crime Response Teams with as high a closure rate as the one he worked for did not get pleasant Sunday stroll cases. He woke up most nights still fighting to breath.

 

"Special Agent Anthony Dinozzo, NCIS." A Marine stood at attention on his welcome mat. "Your presence is requested, sir."

 

"By who?"  

 

"I'm not at liberty to say, sir."

 

Most civilians couldn't pull off impersonating a Marine. Fact. The ones who did succeed were inevitably caught, usually the first time they caught the attention of a real Marine. There wasn't one thing that he could put his finger on and say whether or not the man at his door was, in fact, a Marine. But Tony had worked day in - day out, and sometimes through the night with a retired Marine. He had seen members of the Corps in all states; shaken, shocked, furiously angry, bitterly jealous, frightened and sick. Gut instinct said this man was the real deal.

 

"Got any ID, Marine?" There were some good fakes in the world, but Tony was pretty sure that this wasn't one of them. Everything from the words to the construction looked and felt authentic.  He took a risk. "Come on in, I should at least put some real clothes on."

 

Experience had taught Tony to dress well and to dress fast. There was no such thing as ‘off duty’ for Leroy Jethro Gibbs’s team, just varied levels of on call. All told it took less than fifteen minutes, not a record, but not shabby. Anyone orchestrating a pick up in the middle of the night would’ve factored in the time. Anyone who wouldn’t factor in the time to dress, wasn’t knocking on doors to wake people up. They were pushing doors down.

 

Tony wasn’t rushed. The Marine waited quietly in the living room and then escorted him down to a dark colored town car waiting outside his apartment building. The drive was quiet, the flashes of the D.C. nightlife turned into smears of colorful light in the window.

 

“Where are we going?”

 

“I can’t say.”

 

“It’s very _Mission Impossible_ , not from the Bureau are you?”

 

The Marine didn’t reply.

 

Eventually, the town car pulled into the empty parking lot of a currently abandoned office building set far back from the road and where, in the day, Tony was sure the wooded property made a discrete screen from the rest of the world. The NCIS Agent was more concerned with the security cameras: two on either said of the lobby entrance, one on the corner facing the area they parked, five that he could see in the lobby and none of them were on.

 

The light was on behind the front desk, and the computer was running but no one was seated in the chair. His escort had a key card for the elevator and without saying anything the Marine inserted it and the elevator rose and rose and rose all the way to the top of the floor.

 

The Agent hadn’t regretted his decision to follow the Marine but the skin on the back of his neck was prickling in warning. Something far outside the realm of his regular schedule was going down here. Tony wasn’t sure if he was impressed or concerned. Whatever it was didn’t look good.  

 

"Please leave all electronic devices out here, Agent Dinozzo."

 

Carefully setting down his bag, and putting his phone on top Tony gave the stern faced Navy woman who’d met them at the elevator his most charming smile. "If you ask for my gun and my badge next, I'm going to have to decline."

 

"No," she said. No change in posture or expression except that the wrinkles between her brows became slightly more pronounced. "Just your phone."

 

After a careful pat down and wanding, following which he took off his jacket, cuff links and watch, but still kept his gun and badge, he was allowed into the office he'd been lead to.

 

Tony wasn't sure what he'd been expecting. The collection of men arranged about the room was definitely not it.  His first instinct was to salute, which only meant that he'd been spending way too much time with his boss. He settled for a respectful nod, "Secretary Davenport, Sirs."

 

There was a lot of very powerful people in this room. An Air Force General, Hammond, sat next to Tom Morrow, the director of Homeland Security. The Director of the FBI sat next to the Secretary of the Navy, and Secretary Davenport himself sat at the head of the table.

 

“Take a seat Agent DiNozzo,” Morrow said with a small smile. “We’ve got some posturing to get through, and then a couple of questions. Hopefully this won’t take too long. I doubt Gibbs has changed that much since I left. Just off a case, you need some sleep.”

 

Tony gave an answering smile and slid into the empty seat.

 

“At least a little posturing, right?” Director Andrew Hacker snorted. “Pretty sure it’s what powers bureaucracy.”

 

Morrow snorted in return, and Tony would’ve sworn that the General’s lips twitched. He didn’t know what was going on, but now he was supremely curious. In all his time as a federal agent Tony hadn’t met many powerful men willing to laugh at themselves.

 

"Anthony Dominic Dinozzo," The Secretary of the Navy started sternly, reading from what was likely his service file. "Six years at Rhode Island Military Academy, full ride to Ohio State on a sports scholarship before an accident on the field blew out your knee. A Bachelor’s Degree in Physical Education from OSU, A Bachelor’s degree in Criminal Science from OSU, A Bachelor’s in psychology from Georgetown, and a Master’s in criminal psychology from Georgetown.

 

"Police academy plus two years as a beat cop in Philedelphia before Vice puts you undercover with the Moretti mob family. A year as a detective in Peoria where your last case was to arrest your own partner. Then the transfer to NCIS where you passed training with full marks and succeeded in pulling off the impossible; working with Leroy Jethro Gibbs for over nine years. A couple of arrests on three different accounts of murder, no convictions."

 

There were some chuckles through the room. Tony wasn't quite sure who everyone was but they all seemed familiar with Gibbs's reputation. Tony didn't laugh. He didn't really even smile. He sat before the Secretary of the Navy and the heads of two major federal institutions in a conference room in Tyson's Corner in the middle of the night. It wasn't for a 'good job' and a handshake.

 

"Agent Dinozzo, I have to admit that you first came to my attention while Jenny Sheppard was the Director of NCIS; she was being investigated for corruption. When I was told that you were the Agent she sent undercover on vigilante crusade, I expected an agent in her pocket."

 

Tony was experienced in swallowing down humiliation, shame, and disgust. Emotional control was practically a requirement for an undercover agent. Nothing he said could fix what happened. Not what happened to Jenny, and not what she dragged him into. He did his best to accept the judgment, but it didn't keep him from feeling sick.

 

"Imagine my surprise," SECNAV continued, "when investigation revealed a damn good agent, worn down by the job and taken advantage of by his superiors. You told her no three times before you finally gave in. Why?"

 

Tony cleared his throat, "Excuse me, Secretary Davenport. Why what?"

 

"Why, after exercising your right to refuse on three different occasions, did you finally accept an assignment that you suspected was unauthorized?"

 

What could he say? That her attention, even when he knew she was manipulating him, was about the only good thing in his life at that point? He knew he was good at undercover work, and that when his day to day attempts to run MCRT led to utter failure it was nice to know that he was still good at _this_. How could he tell these utterly capable men that putting on the legend of Dr. DiNardo for the time he spent with Jeannie was like a breath of fresh air. Living DiNardo for even just a minute made Dinozzo's life feel less like it was falling apart at the seams.

 

"The last time Jenny Sheppard approached me about going undercover she said that if I didn't do it than she was going to have to approach Dan Shetlan." Tony shook his head, bracing himself against the conference table. "Dan Shetlan is a good man and a good agent; fine for the momentary undercover assignments, like an immediate sting, but I knew he didn't have what it took." Tony shrugged, keeping his gaze focused at a spot on the table near POTUS. "Dan Shetlan would've never survived. Jeannie Benoit would’ve known something was wrong within an hour of meeting him. I knew it and she knew it. So, I took the assignment."

 

"Your ability to do whatever it takes is what lead to you being the undercover agent of choice for almost four different federal agencies." Director Hacker quirked a brow, "I'm surprised you can even go undercover anymore. With over a hundred operations under your belt don't you get recognized? Kudos, honestly. How do you do it?"

 

"Considering that Agent Dinozzo has a closure rate of 85%," Morrow replied, "I'm going to guess that the criminals don't often have the opportunity to blow his cover."

 

"Which brings us to the point for why we are all gathered here." The general interrupted, Hammond was the name on his jacket. "I have a serious problem that could use a man of you’re skill set."

 

"I'm not doing it again.” Tony frowned, the type of op that Sheppard ran was dangerous for a million reasons. Only one had anything to do with backup. “Trying to live a day job and run an undercover operation. It's too much."

 

"No, we all agree. Sheppard screwed you over on that one." Hacker shook his head and leaned forward. "What we’re proposing is for you to go undercover on Hammond’s, technically O’Neill’s base, and figure out what the hell is going on and who's pulling the strings."

 

"Let me get this straight," Tony was just watching the general now, "you don't have a body or a theft. Probably not any complaints either, just a suspicion that something on your base isn't running as smoothly as they say."

 

"We've had thefts before,” General Hammond frowned, “it just takes several months for them to show up as missing items."

 

Tony blew out a heavy breath, he didn’t want to do it. "So, what's the legend? An administrator? Logistical support?"

 

"A Marine." Secretary of Defense scowled, passing over a manila envelope to the stunned detective.

 

The documentation was all set for Anthoni DiNavo, 37, recently enlisted in the United States Marine Corps. It stole Tony's breath away.

 

"Why? Wouldn't a civilian get just as close?"

 

Hammond shook his head. "That's for after the NDA. For now, all you need to know is that we're getting you as close to where the problem might be as we possibly can.”

 

“Why?” Tony finger through the papers. “Why me? Why so elaborate?”

 

Morrow said, “A military judge found in favor of the defendant a couple weeks ago on a case where a LEO went undercover as a navy officer and there is some discussion about whether or not JAG will bring charges against him for impersonating an officer. You get a special commission for the duration of the investigation. Learn lots of very interesting things and then resign the commission when it's time to go back to NCIS."

 

“Do you love your country Agent DiNozzo?”

 

“Of course.” He resisted scowling. “I’ve given everything I am to the protection of the men and women in the Navy. I wanted to make a difference in the lives of people, keep criminals off the streets, and I have but this-”

 

“You’re right,” Hammond nodded, “this is elaborate, but my men have spent years trying to root these assholes out and it never seems to make a difference. I think this is necessary. I think _you_ are what we need. It’d be long term, but you’ll have all the support you’d need.”

 

“How long is long term?”

 

“We don’t really know,” Hacker said, “you’re the best. Best undercover agent, best investigator in the opinion of most of the alphabet soup agencies. It may only take you a couple of weeks, or it might take you a couple of months. If you don’t have anything in two years, we’ll pull you.”

 

Two years was a long time. A very long time to live a legend. Two years was about the maximum amount of time an undercover agent can stay healthy living a legend. Even then, at two years the thoughts and ideas, mannerisms and beliefs of the person suit that the agent wore could get tangled up in the person the agent identified with. He’d done it before. He’d worked the case in Philedelphia with the Moretti clan for just short of two years. Tony had spent months recalibrating his responses to things. To right and wrong. He’d worked hard on it. Liked what he’d looked like on the inside after he was done. 

 

This would be very different. Different than anything he’d ever done before. And yet the same as well. It was just one more time going undercover. One more time investigating corruption. One more time putting his life and sanity on the line for the well being of the people he served with.

 

“And Vance? My team at NCIS, what will they be told?”

 

“I have some serious concerns about the shit I’ve been hearing the MCRT pulls.” SecNav gave a shark’s smile, “You’ll be transferred out, paperwork will say that you’re on an Agent Afloat assignment on the USS Deadalus. And the MCRT, and the DC NCIS hub will be going under a strenuous audit. Don’t worry, you’ll still have your job at NCIS after all this is over.”

 

“I can’t.” Tony shook his head passing the documents back to SECNAV. “What you’re asking for is a lot. If you’re asking for this much than I can only imagine that you need it just as badly, but there has got to be someone else who can do it. You don’t want me. I’m used goods. Broken.” Tony stood from his seat and straightened his shirt sleeves. “If you’ll excuse me gentlemen, I’ll get out your way.”

 

“Just a minute, son.” General Hammond stood from his seat, passing over a fairly non-descript business card. “We don’t have a Plan B, at the moment. If you change your mind, even a month from now, give me a call. We could use your help.”

 

Tony just gave an uncertain nod and turned his back to the room. It was painful. These men said they needed him. They needed his skills. Right now, though, Tony couldn’t even figure out who he was let alone how to be someone so different. He needed to get back to who Tony DiNozzo was, even if he didn’t like him. His family needed Tony DiNozzo. And he needed his family.

***

The body had been in Redwoods Estates, a gated community popular with the men and women who worked on Capitol Hill. All large houses with picturesque landscaping, open floor plans made for holding parties, and the type of sweeping cathedral vaults designed to make visitors question their worth. And now there was a body.

 

“Gibbs here yet?” The Senior Supervisory Agent asked, meeting up with his teammates and the ME outside of 292 Starlight Drive. Nothing separating this house from the rest except for the yellow crime tape and the fleet of law enforcement vehicles that made the street look like a parking lot.

 

“No,” Ziva answered, fixing her cap over her pony-tail. “Just us and the lions.”

 

“LEOs,” McGee correct, “not lions.”

 

“It is certainly a profession for the proud and brave.” Dr. Mallard smiled as he arranged his bag of tricks by his side. “In fact, many cultures have associated the lion with peacekeeping and law enforcement. Why-”

 

“Thanks, Ducky.” Tony cut in, gesturing with one hand toward the house, “but we don’t want Gibbs to think we’re laying down on the job.”

 

Ziva scoffed as she proceeded the men, “I will bag and tag.”

 

“I’ve got the witnesses!” Tim said, quickly jogging over to the waiting LEOs.

 

“I guess I’m on shoot and sketch.”

 

“I thought you said that Ziva could use some work on her sketches?” Palmer asked as they both followed Dr. Mallard up to the house.

 

Tony just shrugged. They hadn’t listened to him before Gibbs’s accident. And they sure as hell hadn’t listened to him when the Bossman was gone. There wasn’t much luck in it changing now. “I left a note on her personal review, but I don’t think anyone’s looking.”

 

Palmer nodded, “You think Gibbs’s going to make them switch?”

 

“Switch what?” The grizzled Marine growled from behind the two, “What is this, Sunday stroll? Gossip on your own time!”

 

“Yes, Boss.” Tony winced as he moved up the steep driveway. Left behind with Palmer by a teammate yet again.

 

The day didn’t get much better. The case was easy enough. Anaphylactic shock was an awful way to die. Hives had swollen up around the Petty Officer’s throat. From the scratches on his face and the disarray of the kitchen, Jones hadn’t even known what was going on when he died. The man had likely laid on the cold kitchen floor for a minute or more as his own immune system slowly killed him. Not capable of controlling his body but still aware as his throat slowly closed, and his vision faded.

 

Even at his most paranoid Tony didn’t think this would turn into a murder investigation. Petty Officer Jamel Jones was a guest at the Carlsen house, the son of friends of the owner. Jessica Jones, his mother, had asked the Carlsens to make her son welcome while he was on liberty in Baltimore.

 

They had invited him for dinner the night before and encouraged him to sleep in their guest bedroom to save him the cab fare. When Mr. and Mrs. Carlsen had left on the early side of 6am for work the Petty Officer had still been asleep. The cleaning service had found him dead in the kitchen around 9 am, 911 half dialed on the home phone, a dish of casserole and a partially eaten piece on a plate on the counter.

 

“Official cause of death is anaphylactic shock, not pretty,” Dr. Mallard said handing over the report. “But common, even in this day and age. Sometimes an allergy is simply too fast for medical intervention. And this poor fellow didn’t even have any of that.”

 

“It could still be murder,” Ziva insisted peeking at the keyboard. “I know of many ways a killer could hide an allergen in a tempting dish.”

 

“Enough.” Tony counted to three. Snapping, let alone at the Mossad Liasion would not help at all. “I called the Petty Officer’s mother and pulled his medical records, no one knew he’d had an allergy.”

 

“So, someone could have slipped the tree nuts into the casserole.” McGee said. “It’s not like we’ve never reopened a case because you thought something was wrong.”

 

“Yeah, McProbie, but you’re trying to tell me that someone decided to murder the Petty Officer by using an allergy that no one knew he had, at the house of family friends that no one on the ship knew he was visiting?”

 

“Maybe it was someone who had seen him have a reaction before!” Ziva smirked, “Come on, Tony. You’ve never had a medical issue you didn’t admit to?”

 

“If you’re referring to an STD, _Officer David_ ,” Tony glared at the duo across the bullpen, “then the answer is no. I haven’t. And Petty Officer Jones would not have been able to ignore a reaction that strongly. If it happened even once before there should be at least a record.”

 

“Actually, Tony,” Tim offered, “oftentimes it takes a second or third exposure to an allergen before symptoms show up. He might have had a minor reaction and took something over the counter that cleared it up.”

 

“I’m still not hearing murder.”

 

“I am not convinced it was not murder,” Ziva sniffed, “and nothing you say will change my mind.”

 

“Fine,” Tony slumped over at his desk. Nothing he said was going to fix this. “Fine. You’re convinced that this is murder? Then start over again. Call his unit, call his parents, call the Carlsens again. Ask everyone if they had heard anything that suggested the Petty Officer had an allergy.”

 

“Don’t bother.” Gibbs growled, stalking around the divider that separated the MCRT office space from the rest of the bullpen. “It’s a waste of resources. Nothing suspicious happened here. Just an accident.”

 

McGee ducked his head with a meek affirmative, but Ziva stood at her desk and stared down the old sniper for a minute and then two before finally letting the tension seep from her muscles. She didn’t say anything. Just offered the senior agent a nod.

 

He couldn’t believe it, except for all the ways he could. Ziva and Tim had been on his case for months, hell, almost a year now. Never, not once did they trust that his explanation was because of experience and not second or third guess it. Tony wasn’t often wrong. Not when it came to the motivations of people hurting other people. That all it took was a single hard-eyed statement from Gibbs to get the two to stand down and start their paperwork made Tony furious. Too furious to even talk.

 

Sitting at his desk ramrod straight and determinedly focused on his own paperwork, because if he had to see a single disrespectful thing from either one of them he was going to send them the bill for his dentist. His teeth would not survive it.

 

His phone rang. He didn’t jump. He hadn’t lost his situational awareness; not even in the bullpen. He did, however, need a moment to take a deep breath. Tony was a master of the long con. Switching and adapting with every hit he took, but he didn’t often allow himself to get angry while undercover. So he needed a moment. To recalibrate. To remind himself of his role.

 

“Very Special Agent Tony DiNozzo, NCIS.”

 

“Agent DiNozzo, Director Vance would like to speak with you.”

 

One more deep breath. “I’ll be up momentarily.”

 

Tony had lived his entire life in that grey area between good enough to get the job done and not catching the attention of powerful people. They only exception had been Gibbs. Gibbs required excellence, required more than everything his agents had to give, he drove people so far past their limits that they realized they didn’t have them to begin with. Gibbs was a bastard and not afraid or concerned with catching anyone’s attention. And Tony had hid in the grizzled Marine’s shadow for eight years and counting.

 

Now, in the span of two days he had caught the attention of far too many men with the power to make him very uncomfortable.

 

“What did you do?” Ziva snickered. “Must have been bad.”

 

Tim snorted, “Accused of murder again Tony?”

 

“We’ll just have to see, McGeek.” Buttoning his suit jacket he gave a slight tug to make sure everything lay just right. Off to beard the lion in his den. 

The walk from the MCRT bullpen to the Director's Of ice wasn't long. On a good day it was a quick jog up the stairs, on a bad day it could be as long as a funeral march. Tony hadn't been having many good days.

 

He had to wonder if the call had anything to do with his late-night appointment. Yesterday's brass hadn't seemed like bad men, but Mob bosses attended Mass religiously, serial killers lived in pretty little suburbs, and politicians lied with a smile on their lips. Men who seemed reasonable when no one was watching could be hard liners when the cameras were on.

 

It wouldn't be the first time Tony was encouraged to cross a line. He'd always walked away before. Before Gibbs with his carrot and stick, his family and his bark. Tony had become invested, put down roots, made friends, adjusted to the demands of the job. When Tony weighed the disadvantages: the late nights that turned into early mornings, the verbal abuse, the physical hits that landed like grenades against his heart; against what he'd gained: a home, a job he did well, and the respect of his co-workers, Tony had always believed it been worth it.

 

What was this operation? Was it such a big deal in the grand scheme of things? He liked NCIS. He liked working with, protecting, the men and women who'd soworn to protect everyone else. The feeling when he saw a family reunited, a victim was validated, a murderer convicted; it was the best feeling. He'd made a difference. 

 

Tony didn't know the details for General Hammond's command. SECNAV did though. And Hacker did. They both thought the operation was important enough that they wanted someone outside of everything to conduct the investigation. As a matter of National Security. Wasn't that just as important as what he was doing now?

 

Maybe, if Vance insisted, he'd say yes. SECNAV promised his job would be waiting. And his team would still be here. Maybe.

 

But Vance was new in his position and Tony had been at NCIS through the last two Directors. The thought of Jenny lying on Ducky's gurney still ached, regardless of the mess she had made. For all that Tony had been just one more tool for her to use in her vendetta against The Frog; he didn't blame her. He couldn't swear that in her place, getting vengeance for a member of his family, Gibbs or Ducky or maybe one of his fraternity brothers, that he wouldn't go to extreme lengths as well.

 

Maybe Vance just had questions. Tony was pretty sure his reports were all clear, but it was possible. here were a hundred other possibilities for what the new Director wanted, but he wouldn't go to Tony for most of it. Tony hadn't been team lead for several months.

 

"Cynthia," Tony offered with a smile. "Is the director ready for me?"

 

The secretary just gave a tight nod, her lips turning down at the corners and refusing to move her gaze from her monitor. "You may go straight in, Agent DiNozzo."

 

Tony was a professional. Not once in two years during the ‘More to I’ investigation had they ever questioned his loyalty. And the only snag he'd ever had undercover as Dr. DiNardo was that he'd gotten to close to his cover. Leon Vance didn't have a chance. 

 

"Come in, close the door, and take a seat, Agent DiNozzo."

 

It wasn't the principal’s office. The chairs in front of the desk weren't plastic. This wasn't a cement and cinderblock room. Nothing smelt like gym socks and vomit. But Tony did sit uncomfortably deep in the seats arranged in front of the desk.

 

"What can I do for you, Director Vance?"

 

"I have some questions." The big man behind the desk didn't pay his agent much attention. Far more concerned with what was on his screen. "Director Sheppard offered you three different positions on teams with more opportunity for advancement. Tell me why you stayed? Left holding the bag for Gibbs."

 

Tony shrugged with a smile, “Neither Director Sheppard nor I actually thought Gibbs was permanently gone. It seemed like the better choice to keep the team together. And he did come back.”

 

“Yes. He did.” Vance said, grinding down on his toothpick. He finally offered DiNozzo his full attention and Tony kind of regretted it. “I’ve heard about you since you stepped foot in the door. The only Agent Gibbs never scared away. The Bastard wrangler. The Man of a thousand faces, one of the best undercover agents in the federal government. Bar none.”

 

Tony didn’t know what to say and it didn’t look like his boss was looking for an explanation, so he kept his mouth shut.  

 

“I don’t like Agent Gibbs.” Vance said. “He closes cases, but he’s been allowed too much leeway. He barely even meets the qualifications to be a team lead anymore. No computer or technical skills whatsoever. And neither do you.

 

“As far as I can tell, you’re a good investigator but lazy and irresponsible in the field, a liability and embarrassment to this agency. How can I trust you to represent this organization to the public and the other federal investigators when I can’t even trust you to act in a professional manner within the bullpen?” Vance clenched his teeth, clearly furious but working through it. Trying his best not to be hypocritical. This was supposed to be an intervention, not a whipping. “I don’t like you, and I’m furious that your dereliction of duty resulted in the death of Jennifer Sheppard. But I recognize that the majority of your failing can be attributed to a poor role model.

 

“I’m giving you another chance. I’m sending you Afloat.” Vance handed over a sealed envelope. “You’ll be sorted to the USS Seahawk for the first five months, and then to Paris Island for the second tour of five months. While you’re away I want you to read up on all the new procedure and conduct policies. You can finally finish the graduate work you’ve been postponing.”

 

“Director Vance, you don’t understand.” Tony sat forward, bringing his hands up to clutch the edge of the desk. “Gibbs needs me. The team is unbalanced and if you remove me than the team might collapse altogether. I’m telling you-”

 

“No.” Vance snapped, “You don’t get to tell me anything. It has been impressed on me by several different people that I would be a fool to dismiss you out of some type of fit. So we’re going to go through with this plan. We’re going to see how you measure up in ten months. If you don’t like it, you can see HR on your way out. It’d be no skin off my nose.”

 

“But the team-”

 

“If your team is that close to collapsing that they need you to hold their hands Agent DiNozzo then they should collapse!” Vance scowled at the desperate man, “Enough. I’m done with this conversation. Make your choice and leave.”

 

Tony grabbed the white envelope and left the director’s office without another word. He didn’t look at Cynthia on his way out and he completely refused to return to the bullpen. His teammates were like sharks and if there’d been chum in the waters before, now Tony might as well be bleeding. They’d eat him alive. Use his bones like toothpicks.

 

He escaped to the emergency stairway in the back of the bullpen and went up a flight of stairs to the landing just before the roof door. Sitting on the floor up here would ruin his designer slacks, probably put tears in his expensive jacket, but he didn’t even think twice to sit on the linoleum. Not quite rolled in a ball and bawling his eyes out. Tony didn’t cry. The men in his life had cured him of that weakness a long time ago.

 

Instead the man sat on the floor very quietly with his legs stretched out before him. The envelope off to his side. This was like a bomb waiting for careful detonation. Ready to wipe out all the good work he’d been doing at NCIS, in DC, for his team. Ten months at sea. Sounded more like torture than a come to Jesus. 

 

No television. Certainly, couldn’t take his movie collection, even if most of them had been ripped to a hard drive. No gourmet food, though he’d been well adjusted to the institutional grade served on the ship. They’d served it at just about every other institution he’d been at as well. No dry cleaning, which meant no suits. Nothing that he could stand to see destroyed.

 

Ten months at sea. Tony hadn’t even said yes, hadn’t packed, hadn’t shipped off yet and the thought still gave him the chills.  Ten months as an enemy to just about everybody on the ship, maybe even the Captain. He’d be there to nitpick and pick out everyone on the vessel who disobeyed orders. Who brought contraband on the ship. Everything from alcohol to drugs, and Tony would be expected to handle it.

 

He’d be without friends or support, and no back up. An enemy across the lines. He might as well take that ridiculous operation from Morrow.

 

Tony slipped his hand into his pocket and fingered the plain embossed business card. Could he do it? Just walk away for a year, or more, to pretend to be a Marine? Could he even pass muster? Gibbs worked them all pretty hard and Tony was good at assuming roles, but was he good enough that he would be taken for one of them?

 

When had an operation to the middle of nowhere, without any type of background information, for now, become a viable alternative to ten months at sea?

 

Probably around the same time that Vance made it clear Gibbs was not going to be allowed to keep his team. The director was already in the process of taking the team apart. He was just the first under the ax.

 

So, he could be wasting time on a ship, pandering to Vance’s expectation that the only investigator NCIS should have should look like him. Or he could get up to his eyeballs in what could be the most hairy and terrifying operation he ever accepts.

 

Tony dialed the number on the card.

 

“General Hammond’s office.”

 

“Tony DiNozzo, NCIS, to speak to General Hammond.” He resisted the urge to fiddle with his cuffs as he waited.

 

“Just a moment.”

 

Any minute now his team might come barging into this small piece of paradise looking to get their fill.

 

“Ah, Agent DiNozzo. How are you, son?” General Hammond sounded genuinely pleased to hear from him. Tony couldn’t imagine that there were too many people with his skills, that the general might be willing to trust with an operation this sensitive.

 

“I could be better.” He took a deep breath, “Did you know Vance was going to send me Afloat when you first offered the operation?”

 

“Ah, yes,” the General said, “Davenport was aware that Director Vance was maneuvering to break up the MCRT.”

 

“I see,” He turned the card over and over again between his fingers. Letting the silence stretch a bit.

 

“Have you made any decisions about what we asked you?” Hammond inquired. “We want you for this, but even we can’t just vanish an NCIS agent from a warship surrounded by thousands of sailors. You can wait a little longer, but if you get on the ship than we’re assuming you’re saying no. And you can say no, son.”

 

“No.” Tony whispered, “I’ll do it. I’m just not very happy about it.”

 

“Well, I’m sorry about that.” Hammond said. “I’ll run everything through Davenport. For now, you’ll meet your contact at the cafe _Sugar_ _and Spice_ at 11 am tomorrow morning. He’ll be sitting on the patio reading _The Art of War_. Any questions?”

 

“No, sir.” Tony said before politely ending the call and shoving his phone back in his pocket.

 

His life had completely changed. Everything had changed. Regardless of what General Hammond and Secretary Davenport said about his job and his life waiting for his return. Nothing was ever the same after a long undercover operation. Even if he still returned to his job at NCIS, if the team survived Vance’s appointment, _he_ would still be different it was impossible not to be. And that was the most dangerous part.

***

No one had died. That was about the best Tony had come to expect with his team. No blood. No broken bones. Though the same couldn’t be said about hearts and souls, as dramatic as that sounded. The news had come down. Ziva was to return to where ever she came from in Israel. McGee was to return to where ever he came from in cybercrimes. And Tony was going out to sea.

 

Well, that was the official cover. It was what everyone was told, and at this point that included Tony.

 

_Sugar and Spice_ was an artsy independent cafe about halfway between Quantico and the University. It had some interesting art on the walls and a couple of autographs from people Tony knew were supposed to be important but weren’t celebrities or politicians.

 

And there was a man, greying hair, weathered skin, nice suit, sitting out of the line of sight on the patio. Paging through the _Art of War_.

 

“I like the scene in _Battleship_ ,” Tony said as he sat down. “Alexander Skarsgard and Rihanna play minor roles as passably good sailors, while Taylor Kitsch plays a great underdog. ‘’ _Fight them where they_ _’re not’, never understood that line.’_ ”

 

“Never saw it.” The other man gave small smile, “What’s it about?”

 

“Alien invasion of Earth.” Tony shrugged. “It’s not _Independence Day_ , but it’s not bad. Ok plot for being based off a board game. The acting wasn’t terrible, no enormous plot holes. Special Effects were pretty good and the aliens were different. A real departure from expectations. People didn’t like it, said it was unrealistic.” Tony made a face, “It was an alien invasion, not like there’s much realistic about that.”

 

“Right,” the man said faintly, “Try the cannoli, it’s not bad.”

 

“Cannoli,” Tony raised an eyebrow, “Outside of Manhattan? Can’t be that good.”

 

“David Rossi,” He put down the book, “And you’re Tony DiNozzo?”

 

“Guilty as charged,” He murmured, taking the stack of papers in an inconspicuous blue folder. No logo attached. “We’re going to do this here?”

 

Rossi hesitated then stood. “No. If you don’t like the Cannolis than we’ll go home. At least at my place I’ve got fresh pasta.”

 

“You’re lying,” Tony narrowed his eyes at the man he figured would be his handler. “I don’t know anybody but me that makes pasta fresh. Did it come wrapped in plastic?”

 

“Nope.” The man said as he ushered Tony out of the cafe, making every appearance of doting. “Made from scratch, none of that all-purpose stuff.”

 

Rossi handed him a print out of directions. Instructions to a meeting place that was at least provisionally safe. They left the cafe still talking about the properties of good pasta, and Tony carefully followed the directions once he’d left. The requirements to keep safe while undercover were sometimes like the stuff out of a Bourne movie. Dead drops in the lockers at a public train station. Or code phrases that include Italian pastries and ancient war manuals.

 

Tony parked a block or so away from the final destination and took a pretty roundabout route. It wasn’t enough to really keep someone from finding him if they wanted to, the city had far too many security cameras for that, but the subterfuge was for someone physically following them. It wasn’t like they’d meet here more than once.

 

His handler was waiting in the lounge attached to the hotel. He greeted Tony with a smile and a kiss on the cheek. A hotel room key waiting for them when they went up to the desk. A neat little room that was more office than bed.

 

“I still can’t believe that anyone takes Emril seriously.” Tony said, running hands along seems of windows, doors, vents, picture frames. Watched as Rossi looked under bed skirts and the edges of lamp shades. “I mean come on, how serious is a guy who shouts ‘BAM!’ at his audience?”

 

“Pretty sure that’s regulated to personality quirks,” The agent said, “Food Network loves them. You clear?”

 

“Yeah,” Tony said collapsing onto the single bed. “Didn’t find anything. You?”

 

“No. But just to be sure.”

 

The device he pulled from his pocket looked like a rock. A medium sized white rock that appeared to glow.

 

“And now we’re free to speak.”

 

“That’s not anything I know.” Tony was still looking at the device on the night table. “Which completely rearranges all the questions I was going to ask. Aliens? Really?!”

 

“Yeah,” The man offered the thick manila envelope back to the NCIS agent. “Here read and sign before we get into the thick of things. It gets kind of crazy.”

 

“I’m not sure I like that,” Tony said as he bent over the pile of papers. It was a Non-Disclosure Agreement, though anything but standard. Nothing referencing names or places, just acronyms and threats of violence if he ever opens his mouth to even try to convince someone of something he might see while seconded to the mixed military base housed _under_ NORAD. It wasn’t his first, but Tony figured he probably wouldn’t ever sign anything so detailed again.

 

“Finished signing your life away?” His contact asked a while later.

 

Tony shook out his hand and offered the other federal agent a wry grin. Trying to ignore that he still saw letters swimming in front of his eyes. “I’m pretty good at reading fine print, but I’m still not sure I didn’t sell off my first born child or my soul.”

 

“I have it under good authority that neither the SGC nor the United States Government can force you to give them your child, regardless of genetics.” He gave a too serious look and then a slightly more bemused shrug, “Your soul might be another thing entirely.”

 

Tony wasn’t entirely sure whether he was supposed to laugh or cry. “Is that a serious problem?”

 

Rossi ran a hand over his head, “There might be a problem concerning genetics in the future. It’s not something to worry about now.”

 

“What is worth worrying about now?”

 

“This is for you, for the duration of the operation. It should be set up to let you into any system in the SGC that you want. A record will be kept for security reasons, but it’ll be easier to keep your secret if you aren’t constantly asking for access.” A tablet was passed over. One whose lock screen didn’t require a password or a pin, but a fingerprint. Keyed to Tony. It was a little futuristic. Like something out of Terminator.

 

“Beyond aliens, which I have to imagine they have far better resources than the imagination of a federal investigator. Rossi,” Tony looked up at his handler. “What’s the deal?”

 

“That’s a good question,” his handler nodded, checking the seal on a bottle of water, offering a second to Tony. “As I know it, the problem is that they know they have a problem, but like a list of symptoms without a cause, they don’t know who’s causing it.”

 

“It’s a long list,” Tony said, scrolling down and down and down. “They could certainly use my help, but why put me undercover? Why not just assign an agent?”

 

Rossi gave the younger fed a sardonic look, “They keep getting stonewalled. Someone very powerful does not want them to get the help they need. On top of that, you’ve worked with the military and in the police for a long time. A federal agent walking in and asking people to give up secrets and possibly implicate one of their friends? Tell me that’s going to go over well.”

 

“No,” Tony set down the tablet, “it’s not. It never does.”

***

“Antoni DeNavo,” Tony repeated to himself as he shifted material from packed-for-storage to packed-for-donation. “Undergrad in Criminal Science from Oklahoma, Sooners ugh. Worked as a patrolman in Tulsa, Oklahoma. Lost my job in that corruption mess. Cleaned out the whole department. Joined the Marines after I lost a bet, wanted to see how far I could get before they booted an old geezer like me. Didn’t think I’d actually get through.”

 

He was leaving the furniture and most of the generic kitchen supplies. His specialty equipment was going to go into storage with his collections and his piano. The key would stay with Rossi. “So who are my parents?”

 

The folder was off to the side on the tv stand. “Anna DeNavo, nee Montenegro, former debutante, and David DeNavo, construction business owner with possible connections to the mob. The _Philadelphia mob_ , oh, wonderful.”

 

Philadelphia mob was not something that he liked to be reminded of. Baltimore was worse because it was his partner on the take, but Philly had left scars it would take a lifetime to heal.

 

“So,” Tony figured, “Mom’s dead, killed by the mob, and Dad’s in prison for trying to cover it. And I decided that I don’t want to ever get involved in that shit ever. So, I join the police.”

 

Would it hold water? Maybe. Tony wasn’t sure, it was close enough to his own story that it would be difficult to tell. Might be convincing. Might not.

 

“Tony open the door!” Abby sounds with a couple of thuds against his front door. “I have food!”

 

“Well if you have food.” Tony smiled, “Abby, what are you going here?”

 

“Bringing life-giving goodness, obviously.” She went to set it on the coffee table only to be thwarted by a moving box of dvds. “What’s going on? Why’re you packing?”

 

“I’m leaving, remember?” Tony took the orange chicken and a pair of chopsticks before leaning up against the breakfast bar. There was only one seat open at the kitchen table. “Did you think I’d just leave the place empty for the two or three years Vance schleps me from one corner of the globe to another?”

 

“Pisch!” Abby sputtered, kicking her feet up to the table. “Gibbs isn’t going to let him do that! You’re one of ours, his loyal Saint Bernard.” She gave a bright smile. “Why would they tear apart Team Gibbs?”

 

Tony passed the confirmation of orders. The ones for the USS Seahawk. It would be the starting point according to his professional file. Then he’d be shuffled around until they settled him on a navy vessel nobody had ever heard of before and the following series of postings in his jacket got covered by ‘Top Secret’.

 

“Bahh!” Abby through the offending papers across the table where they’d narrowly avoided the sauce for the sweet and sour chicken. “Vance is clearly evil, maybe even a demon, I should check for summoning circles in his office.” She ignored his annoyed look, “Don’t worry, Tony, I’ll talk to Gibbs and we’ll get this all straightened out. You’ll be back here so soon you’ll get whiplash.”

 

Even if he hadn’t agreed to assist the SGC with their information leak, Vance wasn’t going to let Gibbs call him back too soon. After all, the new director had to prove he was the boss. And cowing down to Gibbs and Abby’s demands sure wasn’t going to help with that.

 

And there was a small voice sitting lonely in the back of his heart that quietly and carefully wondered if he _wanted_ to go back to ‘Team Gibbs’ if Gibbs didn’t want him.

 

It was a dangerous thought and the professional investigator pushed it to the back of his mind and smothered it from his heart. Gibbs had given him a home when he’d had nowhere else to go. Taught him the rules that only pushed him to excel. Had his six when it had just been the two of them.

 

Tony was just wondering if that was still the same Gibbs that had returned from Mexico, because he didn’t know the man sitting at his boss’s desk anymore. Kind of wondered if he ever had.

 

No. No. His home life had sucked. He’d pinned his dreams on his athletic career and that had tanked painfully fast. Then he’d made a career going undercover. Gibbs had sat down for coffee and pie in a greasy spoon in the slums of Baltimore to convince an unlucky cop that he had what it took to join NCIS. And Tony had never regretted it.

 

So he wasn’t going to start now.

 

“Well, then Abbs,” he reached out and tapped her carton, “I’ll be waiting.”

 

“That’s the spirit!” The goth cried, smile lighting up the room. “So do you need help unpack all this stuff?”

 

“Nah,” he shook his head, “I’ll still sublet. If I get called back early I’ll see about getting a smaller place, or something.”

 

“You could always stay with me!” She bounced in the chair, “we could be roomies or ah, coffin-mates!”

 

He chuckled a little weakly, “No offense Abbs, but I don’t want to end up in a coffin until they’re putting me in the ground.”

 

“Aww!”

 

The container was getting a little empty, so he reached over to pour some rice in. “What’s the newest news you’ve heard?”

 

“Well, one of the sisters mentioned that Father Daniel Myers, from the parish on First, was caught cheating at canasta last Thursday. The argument got so bad they had to bring it up to the bishop.” She snorted. “But, um, I’ve been hearing some weird things out west.”

 

“What sort of weird things?”

 

She played with her chopsticks, the carton sounded empty, “Like people disappearing into thin air. One of the guys I chat with online said there’d been a whole group of people gone missing and declared dead from Cheyenne Mountain, only to show up perfectly fine a few weeks later. I mean they got charged for going AWOL, but seriously just showed back up. Wonder where they went?”

 

Cheyenne Mountain. Home of the SGC. Missing people who reappeared perfectly fine after being gone for weeks. Tony didn’t like the sound of that. It had to be connected. “What do you think happened?”

 

“Idk, there’s a bunch of this stuff on the internet about aliens though.” Abby shrugged.

 

Tony sat back, “I’d expect you to be much more excited. Where’s the complaints about fear before friendship or gasping about the types of science we could learn from aliens.”

 

She huffed, throwing her empty carton away. “Aliens are real, I believe it, and humanity can be pretty awesome. We’d be great friends. We can also be pretty nasty. It’s my job, our job, to put those types of people away permanently. If they’re so advanced that they can navigate space I think they’re probably advanced enough to recognize the type of danger we present. I mean we can’t even guarantee peace!”

 

“So you don’t believe it?”

 

“Nah.” She gave a sly smile, “but it’s a fun story.”

 

Tony smiled and laughed a little. “Come on, help me pack some of this stuff.”

 

“Where’s it going anyway?” Abby opened a new box and grabbed a pile of newspaper. “Gonna leave it with Gibbs?”

 

“And his crazy open-door policy?” Tony gave his friend a crazy look. “I don’t think so.”

 

She giggled, wrapping picture frames up to pack away. Old photographs of him and his mom, his year mates at RIMA, the last time his father actually visited on his birthday, his fraternity brothers outside their house on campus, and one wrinkled photo of the MCRT. Kate was in it, head thrown back laughing at Ducky’s frowning face.

 

“I remember this night.” Abby said softly, holding the picture in her hand. “Ducky was so put out; good girl Kaitlin cursing.”

 

“Best choice of game ever,” Tony laughed, “who suggested ‘Bullshit’ again?”

 

“I think it was actually Tim.” Abby admitted.

 

“He went the entire night with a blush like fire across his cheeks!”

 

“I miss her,” Abby rested against his shoulder and Tony wrapped his arm around her. “Everything’s changed.”

 

There wasn’t anything he could say to that. It was true. Everything had changed; it was still changing. Tony couldn’t help but wonder if they’d recognize themselves when it all stopped.

 

***

“Well, Antoni,” Uncle Dave said as they walked up to flight security. “Any last requests?”

 

“I’m going to bootcamp, Uncle Dave.” Antoni rolled his eyes, “Not a warzone.”

 

“It’s the Marines,” the older Italian gave a dry look, “there’s not as much difference as they want you to believe.”

 

Anthony Dinozzo, hidden carefully behind the fragile mask of DeNavo, took the reminder. The SGC recruited heavily from the Marine Corps. Someone had to be watching.

 

“You’re just trying to freak me out.” Antoni shook his head, slapping his Uncle on the back. “Seriously, did you have to wait until the drive up to unload all your freaky war stories?”

 

Uncle Dave laughed, cuffing his nephew upside the head, “You were the one who lost the bet!”

 

“Yeah, Yeah. I lost the bet.” The alarm on his phone gave a chime. Time to cut the goodbye’s short. “I gotta go, Uncle.” Antoni gave his Uncle one last bear hug. “Gonna miss you old man.”

 

“Gonna miss you squirt.”

 

Walking away from David Rossi to enter what was probably going to be one of the longest undercover operations of his life, wasn’t the scariest thing Tony DiNozzo had ever done, but it was pretty damn close. Thing was, Tony knew he could handle the stress of the mission. The stakes were too high for him to bauk.

 

Aliens. Space so dangerous and vast that it was like the Chthulu Mythos made real. All that stood between the vulnerable people of this planet and destruction was the overworked, underpaid and desperately creative people of Stargate Command. Every minute that the thefts continued created the opportunity for whoever was behind it to completely ruin the Interstellar position of the SGC.

 

He took a deep breath. So many lives were riding on his mission. This was the SGC’s last chance. _He_ was their last chance. The dogtags hung heavy around his throat.

***

He had a few minutes to himself to clean up and make himself presentable before meeting his new boss. And he took the time, unraveled the kinks in his neck, and allowed his shoulders to slump in a way they hadn’t in months. It was vital for his sanity, to give himself these stolen moments when he reminded himself of who he was.

 

Antoni DeNavo was a Marine. Pretty damn good at it too, for an older guy just skating in under the age limit. Well liked by his unit and mostly perplexed by being drafted to a ‘dead end’ post in Colorado. A little nervous to meet his new boss.

 

The dogtags hung heavy around Tony’s neck. It took everything he had to keep from fidgeting with the chain under his clothes. He wasn’t a Marine, didn’t believe that anyone other than Gibbs deserved the title of boss, and he didn’t recognize himself in the mirror.

 

Hair he’d spent time and energy getting perfect was shorn short out of necessity. And his form filled out his uniform in ways that would’ve surprised his team, if they’d seen it. Realizing his BMI had gone down and he’d actual put on mass had been shocking. Seeing it in the mirror wasn’t any less so.

 

Between the physical shift, the attitude, and the mannerisms Tony was certain that Gibbs himself could walk past him without realizing it. Which was good; they didn’t call him the best in D.C. for no reason. It was a little dehumanizing though. Realizing he couldn’t even remember the last person who knew the whole of Tony DiNozzo and liked what they’d seen. Including himself.

 

Splashing water on his face, he refused to look into the reflective surface. There were boundaries even he didn’t cross. It was time for him to get to work.

 

Years working the beat and catching his crook of a father in lies had cultivated a gaze that didn’t miss a thing. The faster he solved the problem the SGC was having, the faster he could go home. Back to his movies, his suits, and his home at NCIS. These crooks, just coming off the graveyard shift, they were complacent. Not the source of problems, but a symptom of the issue more than likely. They were certain that no one was looking at them because on some level they knew that no on was. Well, Tony saw them and they went on a list like every other low level scumbag he’d seen on a Navy base. ‘Might be useful later’.

 

It was small things that he could see. A small meeting just off the compound, looked to be settling bets; passed when Tony was bussed onto the mountain. Technically illegal, but cracking down on it is actually worse for morale than letting it go.

 

It was the other stuff Tony didn’t like.

 

The SGC was located under NORAD, and security was tight. He had to verify who he was on every floor he got off on. Obnoxious, but certainly something people could adjust to. And sitting in the back of his mind was the fact that SGC had a fairly high fatality rate, if gauged against other bases in active war zones. For a base in the continental United States the fatalities were absurd.

 

Make it past the first couple of weeks and soldiers and airmen tended to stay. It made sense, the more people who knew the secret the harder the secret would be to keep. But that also bred complacency. When the security staff knows who everyone is by face, why would they need to check badges.

 

On at least two of the check points Antoni DeNavo’s authorization was checked religiously. While Tony DiNozzo watched civilian staff who had forgotten their badges were waved past with wry smiles and gentle admonishments.

 

“Antoni DeNavo, reporting for duty.” He introduced himself for what would hopefully be the final time.

 

“Great,” the airman nodded him in through to the secure conference room. “You’re the last one in. Just go find your paperwork and we’ll get started in a minute.”

 

The airman introduced himself as Paul Davis, the man in charge of legalities within Stargate Command. He walked them through the Non-Disclosure Agreement and explained in really simple terms what they were agreeing to. And no, regardless of what General O’Neill says it does not include any verbiage about your firstborn, your virginity, or your soul. Which garnered a lot of laughs from the mostly grunt types gathered.

 

And then was the big reveal. Where the dozen military men and women gasped as the glass visor retreated to show a view of the big stone and metal ring Stargate activate with a whoosh to spit out a stumbling squad of airmen and academics. He had to admit; there was knowing and there was _seeing._  


	2. Bloody Streets

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> WARNING: Graphic Violence, Organized Crime, Prostitution, Racism (kind of an awful lot). 
> 
> None of this is in the story 'just because', all of it serves a purpose, but if any of it makes you uncomfortable or offends you, you shouldn't be reading it. It is not my intention to be offensive, but I will not tolerate flames.
> 
> P.s. Even though this takes place in 'Brooklyn', all locations are fictional. As in 'Author did no research before writing'.
> 
> P.p.s. Anthing bolded and in brackets is a placeholder & is bound to change.

**Chapter 1**

“Barnes!” Smith hollered from across the dock, a shit-eating grin smeared across his face, waving an envelope with his day’s pay without a care in the world. Like Bucky didn’t scrimp and save and crack nails and heads and bleed for the bills that his family needed to survive. “Got paid! Gonna head out to a bar. Gonna get me some whiskey and somethin’ frisky!”

 

The men working the dock, the ones that traded stories about their family while they all sweat and swore and hauled crates of questionable merchandise for Don Paulo Brancato, they laughed and whistled. Looking forward to company that wasn’t going to complain about the way the smelt or smoked. The others, the ones that trade paper and coin for goods that still worked wet and a crate in the home of someone who didn’t ask too many questions. The ones with dark eyes who wore high collars and long sleeves without thought all day. They stood back and watched. They didn’t laugh.

 

Bucky Barnes existed somewhere between the two. Not quite one and not quite the other.

 

“Nah, gotta get home.” Bucky shrugged his shoulders.  “Maybe some other time.”

 

“Right,” Smith laughed, “gotta run on home to the little missus, ain’tcha? Does he have dinner waiting? Ready to tell you all ‘bout what the little un’s done today?”

 

“I could make you a deal, Smith. Give you the answer, for the teeth in your mouth.” He bared his in something that might have looked like a smile. Far away. “Is that what you want?”

 

“Heh,” Smith wavered a step back, even with an entire warehouse between them. “What you think you’re strong enough to make me eat gruel through a straw?”

 

“Smith,” One of his group tugged on the man’s arm. Whispering heated warnings, not loud enough to be overheard by the others in the area, but not close to low enough for Bucky to miss. “No one deals with Barnes. His games, they’re permanent.”

 

“Permanent?” Smith scoffs, ignoring the clammy sweat he’d broken out in. “He’s just another dock rat like all of us.”

 

“Deal, Smith?” Bucky leaned back against the cement column picking at dirt underneath the jagged edges of his nails.

 

“What’re you thinking-,” Smith shrugged off his friend’s warning starting to step forward.

 

“BARNES!” Their boss hollered with a frown from the dockside offices. “Come get your pay! ‘Fore I give to some other asshole.”

 

He snorted, giving up his post to make his way up to the big man. “Coming, Boss.”

 

“Barnes,” Brown eyes drilled down into his worker’s, holding the envelop out of the other’s reach as he came to a stop. “Don’t play with my men. Tannesy still can’t stop shaking at the sight of cats. You need that? I know work you can take that’ll feed it, but don’t do it here. Alright, son?”

 

Bucky ground his teeth and gave a sharp jerk of his head and tugged the envelop out of the other man’s hand. “Sure thing, boss.”

 

He tucked the paper packet away in his jacket. Walking across the warehouse floor and right into Jan Smith’s space. Shoulder to chest with the larger man Bucky showed off a mouth filled with more teeth than should fit. “Got lucky pal.”

 

Smith shuddered. Eyes going wide and starting to shake just a little. Bucky smirked as he shouldered past the group and out the door, turning his collar up against the chill night air. Someone wouldn’t be sleeping well for a while.

 

It left a jitter in his step and an in his mouth. Biting back the words. Keeping back from casting the lot that Smith’d tied his life to. A deal, a game, a wager. It was all the same to Bucky; he didn’t play with anything less than loaded dice.

 

Stevie didn’t like it though, and a frown creased his forehead as the dockworker made his way through dark New York streets. Tannesy had been like Smith. Certain and proud, unwilling to accept that he wasn’t the king of his own little world until Bucky had made him gag on it. And Stevie had walked around for days with that tight look in the corner of his eyes, watching him like Bucky didn’t know it. Worried.

 

Prayers and damnations running through his mind just like they whispered on the edge of his hearing. The same voice as that damned Sister from years ago. Bucky might not have been godly but there wasn’t a fucking thing unnatural about him. He resisted the urge to run his fingers over the scarred flesh of his shoulder. Not a damn thing to see here.

 

It was a bit of a walk from the dockside able to pay by the day and the small one-bedroom Stevie and he rented in Brooklyn, but Bucky didn’t mind. The things he feared didn’t lurk in the dark.

 

Muggers, however, did.

 

“You’re money, man!” A shaky voice demanded from behind him. “All of it!!”

 

“It’s the fucking Depression man.” Bucky snarled, “What do you think I have?”

 

“You walked off of Old Man Brancato’s docks.” A baseball bat tapped him in the side. “He’s still paying in cash.”

 

“So why don’t you ask for a job?” Bucky said.

 

“I-I don’t,” the man huffed, “I don’t want job hunting advice!” He swung out with the bat, catching Bucky good in the side. “Just the damn cash! It ain’t worth your life!”

 

Stevie would’ve agreed. The Cash wasn’t worth his life. The problem was, it was worth Stevie’s. Rent and groceries, and whatever treatment Stevie was going to need during the winter. It all cost money. So yeah, he needed that cash.

 

“How ‘bout no?” Bucky spun and darted in. Slamming the would-be mugger into the brick building, bat clattering to the alley floor.

 

The kid, and he was just a kid now that Bucky could see him, probably not any older than Bucky himself, had dark smudges under his eyes and the thin look of someone strung out and wasting. It didn’t stop Bucky from breathing heavy through a mouth full of sharp teeth that hadn’t been there a moment ago. He wanted to lean forward and bare down with the sharp points of his upper teeth, to tear this prey apart with his fingers.

 

He could smell it; the kid was fairly swimming in fear with the table turned. It was beautiful. Intoxicating.

 

And Bucky couldn’t do it.

 

He stepped back so that he wasn’t so closely pressed against his prey. Holding him to the wall with one hand, Bucky pressed his face into the brickwork and dug it in a little. “You stupid son-of-a-bitch. You don’t even know how lucky you are right now.”

 

Stevie had a habit of bringing home strays and helping neighbors out of the goodness of his heart. Now he was helping one more, Bucky just wasn’t ever going to tell him about it.

 

“Get up. And for God’s sake, stop your crying.” He huffed brushing off the mugger’s coat like a damn child. “I wouldn’t be surprised if you were wearin’ a diaper! Damn kid.” Not once since he’d greeted the wall with his face had the would-be mugger stopped begging for his life. “You should be pleased. I don’t make it a habit to kill people. My family doesn’t like it.”

 

“What do you want from me?” He wiped snot and tears on the dirty ragged sleeve of his jacket.

 

“I don’t want a fucking thing,” Bucky swore, turning the kid around and kicking him out of the alley and onto his ass, “Just get out of my way. And don’t let me see you ‘round here again!”

 

This was his turf. His and Stevie’s. Their corners in Brooklyn, their dinners and delis, their neighbors and friends. He didn’t want to see that idiot around again, could let something lose to Stevie. The other man had a nasty habit of picking up information that Bucky really wished he hadn’t. It had led to all sorts of uncomfortable situations in the past, like protest assemblies and nurturing sick neighbors. Not bad, Bucky could admit, he’d knew himself well enough to realize that his preference wasn’t going to win him any friends. So, he let Stevie make those decisions. Let Stevie guide his actions. For all that Steven Grant Rogers was so much more of this than he was, Steve was bright and light like a star where Bucky was the creeping darkness of spilled ink. It hadn’t hurt him yet.

 

Bucky bounced the last few feet up to the apartment door, holding it open for Mrs. Nan, the little old Jewish woman from 3B who was always willing to quickly stitch up a new hole in Merida or Muriel’s dresses, who always made stockings for the girls for Hanukah. Even after they’d tried to explain that they didn’t celebrate.

 

She was a sweet older woman who never minded that their pots were made of copper or asked why they couldn’t afford new dresses for the girls, but their spoons and forks and knives were silver. Mrs. Nan just smiled and patted Bucky on the shoulder as she carefully minded her step on the lip of the doorway.

 

“What’s a lovely thing like you, doing out after dark ‘round here?” He gave her a cheeky grin to go along with the low whistle.

 

“James Barnes,” she laughed patting cheeks pink with the cold more than flattery, “You rake! I’ll have you know that I was just out getting the last of the day’s groceries. My Yan’s come down with another cold, it was so good of Steven to offer the medication, but I still needed a few things for my soup. Chicken soup is a better medicine than most of those new anti-biotic things.”

 

“Stevie, ah,” Bucky clenched his hand around the barrister, his smile going a little more forced on the edges, “He gave you medicine?”

 

Mrs. Nan shuffled a little, readjusting her vegetable sack and tugging on the scarf knot near her throat. “He didn’t tell you?”

 

“Ah, Stevie might have,” Bucky ducked his head, reaching out to take her sack and walk her up the stairs, though letting go of the barrister was difficult. “But I’ve come home so tired lately from the dock; I musta just missed it.”

 

She smiled as they reached her door just a few away from the one Bucky shared with Stevie. “You’re working too hard, James. You and Steven do so much around the building, then go out and work work work. I should come over with some of my soup, do you boys a world of good. Fatten Steven up for winter.”

 

Bucky barked out a rough laugh, “If you can fatten Stevie up at all, Mrs. Nan, you’d be a saint!”

 

“Don’t be silly,” she said opening her door and reaching to take the sack from him. “I’m Jewish.”

 

It left him standing in the hall only a few doors down from his own home with a deep worry sitting in his bones. What had Steve been thinking? He was going to need that medicine later in the winter, it was inevitable. He’d worked long hours at the docks, at the grocers in the summer, hauling merchandise for shopkeepers on just about every street in Brooklyn to get enough cash to buy the medicine outright. Just in case.

 

Now it was gone.

 

He blew out a deep breath. Nothing for it, all he could do was ask Steve why. Ever since he met the punk, all his life practically, Steve had been putting other people’s lives, neighbors and strangers alike, ahead of his own. When Steve’s life was the most precious thing Bucky had. He loved his sisters, but sometimes it felt like Steve had offered half his soul the day he’d become friends with Bucky, and Bucky had taken it. He couldn’t live without the other half of his soul.

 

Walking into the apartment Bucky hadn’t realized how cold he had been, much colder than the weather warranted, as the heat burnt through his numb flesh and left a tingling sensation behind. Steve was at the small kitchen table next to the radiator. The girls standing on crates in front of the big sink splashing each other more than they were washing dishes.

 

“Splash anymore water, Mur and you won’t have to take a bath tomorrow.” Bucky said as he closed and locked the door, hanging his jacket on the hook by the door reserved for his jacket.

 

The little girl considered the prospect, eying the water left in the sink and the size of the stack of dishes. Merida, a little older and a little wiser, though only a little, abandoned the game to run to her brother. Whooping as he caught her up and lifted her high into the air above his head. “Bucky!”

 

The man laughed, the cold glint that had been born in the dockside warehouse and followed his walk home finally thawed in the presence of his family. There was no room in her heart for bitterness to reside next to the warm glow of his sisters. “And what did you do all day, you pest?”

 

“Not a pest! Not a pest!” Merida squealed, trying without success to get out of her brother’s grasp. “Bucky! Bucky!”

 

“Alright, alright.” Steve interrupted catching up the slightly too large girl-child out of his friends tickling fingers, chasing her back to the sink to finish the dishes as Muriel came over for her own kiss and hug. “That squealing was getting far too loud.” He chuckled, “My poor ears.”

 

“What did you do today, Mur?” Bucky asked the quiet little girl sitting on his lap as he slid the plate of dinner they’d left for him closer.

 

“We stitched with Mamo,” She whispered into the cloth over his shoulder. “Stockings. Mamo let me use her metal knitting needles.”

 

Both men straightened at that, paling at the implications.

 

“Mur, can we see your hands?” Steve asked, “Do they hurt?”

 

“No, Stevie,” Muriel said stretching her little fingers out to show no blisters, no red sores, no bleeding. Nothing wrong. “I liked it. Do you think Mamo would teach me to knit?”

 

“Maybe,” Steve offered sitting back with a frown and a shrug to Bucky. “We’ll ask her tomorrow.”

 

“Alright!” Bucky went to stand, “time for all good little pumpkins to go to bed.”

 

“Bucky, we’re not pumpkins!” Merida cried.

 

“No?” He frowned at her grabbing the younger sister like a bag of flour over one arm, to her delighted giggles, and snatching Merida by the back of her dress. “Well then, say goodnight to Stevie, little chickens!”

 

“Good night, Stevie!” Muriel offered him a kiss and Merida continued to cry and laugh as Bucky hauled her into the bedroom.

 

“Good night, Sweetheart.”

 

“Are you a potato?”

 

“No!”

 

“A tomato?”

 

“Bucky!”

 

“Maybe you’re cat?” Bucky swung the girls off his shoulder, dropping them onto the old worn mattress and the pile of handmade quilts. “Are you kittens?”

 

“No, Bucky.” Merida said, rolling her eyes and taking her whole head with her.

 

“Hmm,” Bucky tucked the blankets in around their shoulders and leaned down to press a kiss to the soft baby cheek of both his sisters. “Then I guess you must be little girls, and this is the bedtime for little girls. Sleep well, Sweethearts.”

 

“Goodnight, Bucky.” Merida yawned, even as Muriel blinked slowly, each time her eyes opened a little slower, until in no time at all the two girls were fast asleep.

 

“Goodnight.”

 

He sat back at the table his bowl of soup only a little colder and his portion of bread only a little harder, and yet it felt as though stepping away from his sisters in a room not even four feet away had taken all his energy and aged him years. Pushing aside his food Bucky laid his head on the table and closed his eyes. Treasuring the feel of long artist’s fingers carding through his hair and digging into his scalp. “What’re we doing, Stevie?”

 

The fingers paused for just a moment, “What do you mean, Bucky?”

 

“I mean this. Two bachelor men, one sick and the other insane trying to raise two little girls.” Bucky rubbed his face into his shirt sleeves, “We don’t know what we’re doing.”

 

“What do you think we should do then, Buck?” The other man asked, “Take them to the orphanage? Leave them with the church or the city?”

 

“No!” Bucky knifed up glaring, but Steve was only sitting in their other kitchen chair, just as tired as he was. “No, I’m just tired.” He sighed, “And I miss your mom, Stevie. It never seemed so bad when she was here.”

 

“I know.” Steve sighed, crossing his arms and resting his face close to Bucky’s. “I know it’s hard and I know it doesn’t seem like it’ll ever get better, but Ma di- went almost six months ago, and we’ve been holding together pretty well so far.”

 

“I know. It’s just hard, Steve, and I’m tired. I’ve been tried for years it feels like.”

 

He closed his eyes, ignoring the warm moisture rolling down his cheek. Just wanted to sit next to Stevie and not think about raising his sisters without his parents. Or living in the Barnes-Rogers’ Apartment without Ma Sarah. Pretend for just a little while that his life wasn’t hell.

 

“I could take another job?” Steve offered tentatively.

 

Most of the income Steve made, and it was a fairly good amount, was from signage and newspaper comics or advertisements. But he had to eat the cost of materials and more than one shopkeeper in the neighborhood paid Steve for his work in goods. It worked around his health, which Bucky appreciated, but it wasn’t steady work.

 

“No,” Bucky had to remind himself that the girls were only a couple feet away. “Stevie you love doing that art, and you gotta take care of yourself. Stress of a job, working out in the dark air, or walking home late after it’s chilly?” Bucky shook his head. “You can’t do it. You just can’t. You’ll get sick.”

 

“I’m not a dame, Bucky.” Steve frowned sitting back from the table. “I don’t need to be coddled or protected. I’m not that weak.”

 

“Bite your tongue, Steven Grant Rogers.” Bucky glared at him, “Your Mamai would have you over her knee at talk like that.”

 

“Ain’t that the truth. I can feel her wooden spoon now.” Steve snorted and rubbed at the flush spreading across his too pale cheeks. “Mamai worked every day ‘til she couldn’t leave her bed. Strongest person we knew.”

 

“Amen.”

 

That sat in silence mourning the woman that’d raised them. Cin’aed Rogers had succumbed to exposure to mustard gas while serving in the 107th during the Great War. And Mary Barnes had died in childbirth with Muriel, and that only after more bloody sheets, cramps, and tears than any son wanted to see. After that it was just Ma Rogers and Da Barnes for a while, trading kids back and forth across the hall of this run-down tenement building like they had been for years. Then one day Bucky cleared out the old Barnes apartment and moved him and his sisters in with the Rogers because his Da had walked out to work and never walked back in. But they’d made it work, Bucky and Steve and Ma Rogers.

 

Now, though, even months afterward the boys could still feel her loss like the ache of a sore tooth.

 

“Hey, Stevie,” Bucky looks up from the mostly empty cup he was washing down the last of his meal with. “Why’d you go and give the Nans’ your medicine. I,” he shook his head. “I’m gonna be real upset if this is just part of your saving people thing. You’re gonna need it, but you just gave it away?”

 

Steve sighed, “Yeah Mr. Nan needed it, but it’s not my saving people thing. I don’t-”

 

“Can’t say it can you?” A wicked smiled curled the corners of Bucky’s mouth watching Steve try and fail to finish his sentence. “Hah. Even you know it’s a lie!”

 

Steve frowned, “Alright, fine. It’s not _just_ my saving people thing. It’s like this Bucky. Mrs. Shannon on the first floor is rising the price on watching the girls. It’s a dollar a week now that she’s trying to watch five. We- we can’t afford that.”

 

“She won’t take it in kind?” Bucky interrupted, “There’s not something her or her husband need help with?”

 

“I asked,” Steve said, “but she just wants cash. No labor and no debts.

 

“So, like I was saying, the Nans’ daughter married the Covey’s oldest son, he’s a little older than us; lives across town. Well, Mrs. Shannon won’t take pay in kind; but I gave the Nans the medicine they couldn’t afford. They ask if there’s anything they could do, and I tell them about Mrs. Shannon’s price hike. Well, Mrs. Nan goes to Mrs. Covey; and Gran Covey agrees that as long as the girls don’t mind helping with chores she doesn’t mind watching them at all. And she’s not going to charge us at all.”

 

Bucky blinked. “So, we paid for the girls’ care with your meds?”

 

Steve shrugged, “Yeah, kinda.”

 

He watched Bucky sit back from the table and shake his head. “I don’t know what to say, Stevie. I’m upset that we’re out the medicine, but neither of us could take the time to watch the girls during the day.”

 

“I know, Buck, but it’s not so bad.”

 

Bucky leaned his head back, “We’ll work it out. We have to.”

They jumped to their feet as a pounding came from the door.

 

Steve went to find out why someone was making such a racket at this hour of the night. He slid back the deadbolt and safety lock, easing the door open. James Keller stood panting in the hallway. Bent double and braced against his knees the other man was coated in sweat and flushed red like a tomato.

 

“Gotta come quick, Rogers. Mal Henley’s gonna get himself killed.”

 

“What’s going on?” Steve pulled the other man into the apartment, sliding the kitchen chair toward the door. “What’s Mal Henley doing?”

 

“Bucky?” Merida’s sleepy voice came from the back room. “What’s going on?”

 

“Don’t worry about it, Merida. Stevie and I might have to go out, that’s all.” Bucky asked his sister, eyes mostly on his heaving friend. “If something happens before we get back you can go to the Coveys, but just go back to sleep, Doll.”

 

“Okay, Bucky.” Her little face tilted up to show her brother puckered lips, wasn’t too big for kisses yet.

 

“Go on doll,” Bucky offered a stiff smile, pulling the door separating the two spaces shut.

 

“Now, James,” Steve put his hands on the other man’s shoulders and caught his gaze, not letting the man look away. “Calm down and tell me what’s going on.”

 

“Mal’s girl got beat up by her pimp. Asshole just drilled down on her face in the middle of the street. Beatrice is in rough shape.” He shook his head clearing his gaze and frowning at Steve. “Malcolm swore he was gonna rip the asshole’s arms off and beat him with them. ‘See how he likes it then’. But John Telioso is part of Brancato’s mob. Mal goes after him and Brancato turns him into dog food. You gotta get down there and stop him.”

 

Steve was already grabbing his jacket and moving. “Where?”

 

“Corner in front of _Sal_ _’s_.”

 

There had been tough times when the market crashed that October seven years before. Of course, neither the Rogers nor the Barnes had money in that mess, but it touched everyone. It had taken time and a new president to make things better again, and in the meantime everyone did what they had to, to survive. Most had turned to Brancato even if they wouldn’t have touched him with a ten-foot pole before; but for girls like Beatrice Jones, Brancato only wanted one thing. They stood on street corners after dark and sold their body.

 

Mal Henley was a good man. A black man making a living out in Harlem better than most in these times, a musician, but still not good enough to pick his girl up out of the gutter she’d fallen into at near the beginning. Beatrice was pretty smart for barely any education and Steve knew she tried hard to keep the two parts of her life separate. Anyone would, but Mal had a temper like Satan himself had lit the fire in his chest and had the bad sense to go after anyone in his sight when it got lit.

 

He’s was gonna get himself killed.

 

_Sal_ _’s_ was only a couple of blocks over and they took every shortcut they could, pushing themselves to make it. And if Steve was struggling to catch his breath at the end, winded just a little more than the others nobody mentioned it. And the pause? Well, it either gave them the time to second guess their rush or cursed them for not getting there faster.

 

Big John Rossi stood in the middle of the road outside of _Sal_ _’s_ , the dinner most of the working girls took breaks in, spending what little they made on coffee strong enough to warm from the inside out. A specialty of the owner’s. He stood in the middle of the street swinging his pipe, a big long wide thing that packed a punch strong enough to put even the strongest down like a dog, his two thugs ringing his back and the beaten and bloody bodies of Mal and his girl curled up and moaning at his feet.

 

“Think you can take on Big John?” The giant guffed, “Think you can take your girl and just leave?” Big John stabbed down with his pipe, planting it in the center of Mal’s chest even as the other man gasped for breath wetly. “Nobody gets to leave without my say so!” He crouched, face close to the black man’s, “and I don’t fuckin’ say so.”

 

“John,” the name is ripped from Steve’s mouth as he steps forward, away from the men he ran here with. The tableau is awful; Steve can tell, from a lifetime of ending bloody in these alley ways, that the color and pattern on Beatrice’s face meant that something was broken and badly. He couldn’t just stay back, no matter how upset Buck was going to be with him later. “We can work something out. It doesn’t have to be like this.”

 

“Well if it isn’t peewee Stevie.” Big John scoffed, swinging his pipe in a wide arc around him. “Stay out of it pipsqueak, this is business for real men. Not whatever you are.”

 

“Come on, John.” Steve steps forward a little closer. He’s got less skill at persuasion than Bucky has, but Buck’s temper is all shot to hell. Wouldn’t be able to help at all. If he could just get close enough, it might help get through. “What is it you need? Money?” Steve winces but nods, “we could probably work something out. You don’t need to hurt anybody.”

 

“Work it out?” Big John threw his head back and laughed, deep rattling and more than a little chilling. “There’s no working it out here. And don’t give two shits about these dogs, but hurting people? Hurting people is my job, pipsqueak, _and I like it._ ”

 

Without warning Big John took two massive steps forward and swung his pipe like he was aiming for the far edge of a baseball field. It hurt; Steve caught the pipe right in the stomach, and even with a layer of cloth in the way the burn of iron hurt twice as much as the crack of his ribs or the bruises blooming on his skin. For a minute it took all his focus to just keep breathing. He hadn’t known it was iron, the thing shown like glossy aluminum and even steel wouldn’t have burnt through cloth. But iron? Iron was the bane of every fae, and Steve was one of the strongest fae in Brooklyn.

 

“Surprised?” Big John wiped blood off the edge of the end of his weapon. “Knew what you were, freak. Came ready to hunt fairies. Maybe I’ll kill you with it, stab you through the stomach and pin you to the street like a bug. Watch it burn you to crisp.”

 

And Steve might not have been paying Big John much attention, not with his skin bruising and blistering even as he laid there; but Bucky had been. He’d heard every threat, and it had been a long time since Bucky’d even thought before jumping to Steve’s rescue. He certainly wasn’t going to now.

 

Bucky jumped for the giant, climbing him like a tree. He was just coherent enough to watch his best friend do his level best to kill the mob’s best pimp. Steve saw the glint of a silver knife in the other fae’s hand, the pocket knife Bucky never went anywhere without, and the deep jab he got in at Big John’s unprotected side. And the unholy roar as the human threw his across the street. Blood dripped down the pimp’s side to join the pools already on the asphalt. No way to distinguish out now.

 

Sal, the owner of the dinner of the same name, stood in the doorway of his place with a frown on his face. Steve could barely see it in the glare of the streetlight. He tilted his head listening to something Steve was just barely hearing. Police whistles.

 

Big John took a step forward growling, furious enough to spit, pipe coming near in a tight circle, even with his side covered in blood, but one of his thugs pulled on his sleeve. And the police were coming around the corner even as Big John and his men walked away from the group ground into the street. Even as Bucky had attacked Big John others, friends of theirs and Malcolm’s had tried to handle his thugs. There wasn’t one person who’d stood in opposition to Big John and his men that wouldn’t wake up to colorful skin in the morning at the least.

 

Police ran onto the scene whistles blowing and hands on their guns, but they didn’t try to run down Big John and his group of thugs even though they weren’t even running. They just stood near to Steve and the gang from Brooklyn watching as the entire pile of bodies Big John left in his wake twitched, moaned and groaned. Still spilling bloody red and sticky onto the dark street.

 

Sal was already approaching the ones closest to his place with rags and water. Trying, futile it felt to Steve, to stem and clean some of the blood off. One of the police officers stood near, starting to question those few still coherent enough to explain the situation. The older officer, though, he walked slowly through the bodies littered on the ground looking for someone. Coming to a stop only a little away from where Bucky kneeled next to him.

 

“Rogers. Barnes. How’d I know?”

 

“Hey, Officer Keaton.” Steve wheezed, “How’re those trumpet lessons?”

 

“They suck,” Keaton gave a disgruntled huff and pulled out his notebook. “What’s going on?”

 

“Big John Rossi beat the shit out of Beatrice Jones and her boyfriend Mal Henley.” Bucky didn’t bother looking in the officer’s direction, a palm steady on Steve’s chest making sure it rose and fell. “We were just … back up.”

 

“Real nice backup,” Steve snorted, gasping as the air choked him for his humor.

 

“Damn it boys!” Keaton swore, “When’re you gonna learn to mind your own damn business? You know what kinda trouble you could get into?”

 

“Well they already called the police,” Bucky replied, and Steve tried not to choke again as his gasping breath turned into a raspy laugh.

 

“This is serious!” Keaton leaned in close. “There are a damn hell lot more powerful people in this city than the police. And Don Paulo Brancato is one of them. That old man has his hands in so much of this city’s workings that the mayor may as well not take a shit without his say so!”

 

Steve just sat and listened, nodding as one of their friends passed over a glass of water and a rag for their own clean up. “We know that.”

 

“Do you?” Keaton glared, “Because to me it sure don’t look like it. You got two little girls relying on you and what’d you do but get into a fight with one of the most dangerous men on Brancato’s payroll. Big John’s got papers thicker than my hands can hold and murder’s just one o’ his tricks.

 

“And damn it, did you think about what’d happen if it weren’t murder?”

 

Bucky shot the officer a disgruntled look, “like what? He beat us up, what’s worse?”

 

Keaton scoffed, “Fighting is _illegal_ , I can have you spend time in county lockup! Bail’s expensive! Or, since he is Brancato’s man, you could lose your job Barnes! And who’d take care of Steve and your sisters then?”

 

Steve groans. Doesn’t even have the energy to complain that he can take care of himself. Which is good, because he’s a little concerned it might not make it passed his teeth.

 

“I know it’s hard, boys.” Keaton sighs. For a minute he looks like he’s going to pat Bucky on the shoulder before he rethinks it and slowly stands to his feet. “But Sarah wouldn’t want you to be fighting. Especially not over some whore like this one. You need to learn to move on.”

 

“Woah,” Steve leans back against his friend, a little dizzy from pain. Sure that he hadn’t just heard that. “Did you- did he seriously just say that?”

 

“Yeah,” Bucky confirmed, pausing from where he’d poured the water over Steve’s burn and shirt both, trying to rinse the iron out. He blinks up at the officer, “You sure we’re rememberin’ the same woman?”

 

Steve hissed, “Pretty sure she slapped you last time you saw her.”

 

Keaton ignores them. “You aren’t adjusting well to her loss, everyone can see it. I know a couple, good Catholic folk,” Steve and Bucky hiss to each other, “they can take good care of the girls. You’d be able to see them, and they’d get a better future.”

 

“Fightin’ words there, officer.” Bucky spit out.

 

“Ain’t in shape to fight for ‘em,” Keaton returned, hand braced over his gun. “You’re not in any shape to take care of your sisters! Look at yourselves! Bucky could lose his job & Steve’ll pro’lly catch his death & for what, a fight with one of Brancato’s men? Not smart. They’re not like you, right? They could be adopted out and be fine. Better than fine because they’d survive whatever suicide run you shits are on.” 

 

“Hey, no!” Steve sat up with Bucky’s help, feeling ten times better already with the iron residue gone. “It’s no suicide run, our friends were in trouble! We couldn’t just sit back and watch! That’s no waste.”

 

Keaton looked back over his shoulder, his junior partner had already worked his way through several of the beat-up boys in the street. The two black folk that started it all not even sitting up yet, just laid out in the street like bodies already dead.

 

“Forget the blacks,” Keaton finally said turning back to Steve and Bucky, “Wastin’ blood on two dogs like that ain’t smart. They ain’t worth it. Stay with your own kind.”

 

“Our own kind?” Steve snarled, “You mean the kind that can’t handle iron without blisters or the assholes who ignore people in need? Because the first doesn’t exist and the second isn’t worth bleeding over either.”

 

“Stevie,” Keaton groaned, “What do you want from me? You should get home, leave this mess alone!”

 

“I want you to act like a compassionate human being!” Steve spit, trying and failing to get up. All his strength going into chewing Keaton’s head off. “Beatrice and Malcolm were hurt by that asshole and you don’t even care! You’re a policeman, you’re supposed to protect people!”

 

“My people,” Keaton spat, taking a deep breath and running his hands through his hair. “I became a policeman to protect _my_ people, not everyone.”

 

Steve blinked, “You should be protecting everyone. Even Mal and Beatrice.”

 

“Yeah, well, the world don’t work that way, Sonny.” Keaton fixed his cap back over his short grey hair. “Don’t do this again. I’ll overlook it this time, but this is the last time. Understand?”

 

“Yeah, Keaton,” Bucky replied when Stevie just stared. “We understand.”

 

The thing was even Steve understood. There weren’t many people willing to help others out of the goodness of their hearts. It was all quid pro quo and trade in kind. Easier with your own kind where you know the rules to those kind of exchanges. Steve understood all too well that the motive for most was fear. Fear of getting hurt, fear of a different set of rules. But it didn’t help those who didn’t have ‘kind’.

 

Steve and Bucky, they were of a kind, but the only ones they knew of like it. There were others, they knew it. The ones at the dock that slipped into the water at dark and out of it dawn. Or the older woman who sat on the street corner four blocks down giving marriage advise to people who didn’t ask for it. And there was a female who worked at _Sal_ _’s_ who needed a stepstool to reach the cash box and most of the dishes, but bounced assholes like they were made of feathers.

 

They were different, all different to Keaton who didn’t even like to acknowledge that Steve and Bucky were normal, even when he’d been seeing Sarah. And well, who knew how many others there were in this world who were the only one or two of their kind left? Like Steve and Bucky were. And they were all of a kind like that. Different, not normal, maybe not even human sometimes.

 

Steve’s thoughts were interrupted as James came back over. His shirt tied together as a sling of his arm, swollen and red near the shoulder joint, could rest in. Blood drying on his face and bruise that might have been one of John’s thugs’ blossoming on his cheek.

 

“Hey,” Bucky offered what little of the water in their bottle was left. “How’s everyone else?”

 

“Not great,” He said. “Everybody’s bruised and beaten at least a little, except Callum.” He frowned, “Callum ran. But otherwise me and Steve, we’re the worst of the backup. But-”

 

“Mal and Beatrice?” Steve cut in, “They going to be okay?”

 

“I don’t know,” James shrugged, then winced as flesh pulled. “Mal’s groaning and moaning, but he won’t wake up; and Sal’s pretty concerned about the glazed look in Beatrice’s eyes. Wants to take them to the hospital. We called for an ambulance.” He just sat quietly beside them, “I don’t think they’re going to make it.”

 

Steve wanted to give reassurances. Anybody could survive if they wanted it bad enough. Problem was Steve didn’t think either of them would fight hard enough to make it back from this. Didn’t want to think about it as giving up, but Steve knew the weight of mortality, the knocking of Death waiting at the door for the last vestiges of life to fade. It took strength to beat that back, and sometimes even Steve laid up in bed didn’t know if he could pull it off as he stared at wisps of what might have been ghosts.

 

“Maybe,” Steve cleared his throat, “Maybe they should think about moving when they get back on their feet. Later. It might be … better.”

 

“Yeah,” James nodded, climbing back to his feet. There was a group gathered around Mal and Beatrice. Plans they could just barely hear to carry the two and meet the ambulance from St. Augustine’s somewhere closer than a corner at the end of the hospital’s reach. No guarantees on how long it would take to get them there either. Best to start soon. “I’ll tell them that.” He clapped Bucky on the shoulder, “Take good care of Stevie, won’t you, Bucky?”

 

“’Course,” the other replied.

 

Steve huffed. Might as well wish the stars to fall and the sun to stop shining. Bucky wasn’t going to let him do anything but lay in bed for at least a week.

 

**Chapter 2**

The bar was dim and cigarette smoke hung heavy in the air when Big John Rossi stepped up to the bar and ordered. “Whiskey, neat.”

 

The man behind the bar didn’t bother with pretenses. He offered Big John the tumbler and left the bottle. The pimp wasn’t an unknown in this place; not with Brancato’s men in and out at all hours of the day. And Big John had a reputation that placed him miles ahead of the bartender’s league.

 

Rossi threw back the first glass of alcohol and hissed as he relaxed into the edge of the counter. He pressed a hand against his side, right under his armpit, testing to see if the bandage had survived his macho bullshit. But his hand came away clean, it was fine.

 

“Fuckin’ _fairies_ ,” He hissed to his back up as the took places around him at the corner. “Got no right buttin’ to our business that way. And for what? Some yellow-bellied dogs who can’t even obey their masters.”

 

Josiah snorted, “Right? What the fuck are they thinkin’? Should be keepin’ their head down and minded their own asses.”

 

Adam, on the other side only grunted, which made John furious on another level, his jaw had broken. Mob Doctor they’d seen had wired it shut. Man looked like he wore a muzzle. A muzzle should have been worn by that Black Bitch, teach her the place she had in this world. Groveling at his feet. John swigged back more of the amber liquid, relishing the burn.

 

They weren’t the only ones in the bar that evening though. Not even close. Just as a young fool sauntered up to the bar, his curiosity itching under his skin and the suit he wore; another sat by the far wall, closest to the back door. Watching and listening closely from mismatched eyes. After all, _his boss_ wanted to know everything about his brother’s business.

 

“Couldn’t help but hear you say someone’s butting into our business.” The Don’s heir raised a brow at the hostility that Big John had to swallow before he could speak. “Mind telling me what happened?”

 

“Course not, sir.” Rossi bit out, grabbing the bottle and leading the way to a booth out of the way of any of the standing groups. And Big John Rossi, the enforcer in charge of the Brooklyn area hookers explained the entire situation to his boss’s son. Stopping only occasionally to wet his lips from the bottle the bartender gave him, or to take a drag from his cigarette. Until the **[heir]** knew the whole story.

 

“Well,” the younger man sat back on his side of the booth, waving one of the waitresses over, “I think that deserves something better than the cheap chuck you’ve got there. You certainly deserve it.”

 

“We probably lost the bitch though.” Big John points out, moving the now mostly empty bottle down the table to make room for the tray the woman was readying for them.

 

**[the heir]** waved a negligent hand through the smoke, “there are other bitches. It won’t be hard to replace her, and we do want to replace her.” He leaned forward to share with Big John, “See a whore who gets ideas above her station can be broken, but honestly, it’s not worth the time or effort. Better to just cut our losses and move on to greener pastures. Someone more willing to show the gratitude for giving them an opportunity to be part of this family.”

 

Big John grunted. He agreed.

 

“No,” the heir smiled, “it’s good that you told me. I can take it directly to my father, make sure he knows what’s going on. But…” he let a frown drag at the corners of his lips, “I am a little concerned about it.”

 

“About what?” Rossi leaned forward, frowning as well now.

 

“We rely, my father relies on your reputation Big John, to do most of our dirty work for us.” He poured the enforcer another glass of quality alcohol. “It’s never our intention to hurt people, that’s just the cost of doing business. So, we send you in. You and your men, you beat stubborn heads and break a few bones and get the point across. We don’t want to hurt you, but we will if you renege on our agreement. Just the threat of you keeps all sorts of people civilized.”

 

Big John Rossi sat back in his seat. Of course, what did the heir think? He was the Don’s best weapon; his strongest. “What’s the problem then?”

 

“Well, it’s clear that your reputation has taken a hit.” The heir sat back and gave a small apologetic grin even as Rossi snarled like someone pulled his tail. “This group of **_skunks_** out in Brooklyn weren’t scared of you. Not enough to mind their own business. We can’t let that stand.”

 

“What do you want then?”

 

**[the heir]** sat at the edge of his seat. “We need to send Brooklyn, and those **_skunks_** , a message about minding their own business and it needs to come from you.” He pushed the last glass of whiskey to the enforcer. “You need to kill the whore and her poor boyfriend. You need to squash any idea that rebellion is tolerated. Not going to be a problem, correct?”

 

Big John hid the curve of his smile in the lip of his whiskey glass. “Not at all.”

 

The heir leaned back with a satisfied air. “Good man. My father will be pleased.”

 

The young mobster didn’t hang around the meeting place long after that. Scooting out of the booth to a waitress handing him coat and hat from the collection in the back. Parting with no more acknowledgement than a confident grin in Big John’s direction. Sure that everything would be handled, and it would be.

 

Not now. For now, Rossi was content to sit back in the booth and sip at the sweet burn of the leftover whiskey. But soon he’d gather up his boys; hanging around the bar making fools of themselves, and he’d head out to put that bitch out of his misery.

 

He knows exactly how he’s going to do it too.

 

That whore and her dog are at St. Augustine’s hospital, in the segregated unit. The staff there aren’t as attentive as in other parts of the hospital. Understaffed and underpaid, and the ones on the night staff, Big John knows they just don’t care. It won’t take any effort at all to walk into the unit later and make sure they don’t wake up in the morning.

 

He figures he’ll use a pillow. Easy thing to find in the long-term care ward, even in the segregated unit. He’ll just pick one up that isn’t in use. He’ll carry it into the black man’s area first, lay it over his face and just lean.

 

Lean until he wakes and thrashes, until his chest hurts, and his heart feels like it’ll burst from panic. Lean until the other screams and then goes silent. Big John’ll lean on the pillow he covers the other male’s face with until he’s sure that the black man won’t wake up in the morning.

 

Then he’ll do it all over again in the next curtained area with the whore that started all of this. It’ll be harder. Adam had busted her face up pretty badly, he’ll have to be careful leaving signs of fresh blood.

 

Or maybe he won’t. Maybe he’ll leave her face smeared with the fresh blood so that everyone who sees it, everyone who hears about it, knows that he was there. That he wouldn’t let any insult stand.

 

If the Don relied on his reputation than Big John would make sure it was a reputation that caused grown men to shake in their boots. Wouldn’t want to upset the boss. 

 

 

*******

Steve held still as the doctor pressed his ear against his chest. No matter how many times he had to endure it, it never got better.

 

The doctor pulled away from his chest with a frown and pressed nearly equally cold fingers to the bruises on his chest and around his ribs. Never a good sign, but Steve is pretty sure he already knows the problem. Broken ribs weren’t anyone’s favorite time.

 

“There’s definitely fluid buildup already,” The doctor confirmed, “It’s good that you’re getting ahead of it already.”

 

Bucky glared from the pillow he’d plopped on the floor next to the radiator. He’d been regulated to straightening the tangled and messy ball of yarn that Mrs. Covey had graciously donated to Muriel’s knitting adventures; along with a pair of large metal knitting needles that, frankly scared the crap out of both boys. They’d placed a request out among their friends for a wooden or bone set.

 

“Thanks for the confirmation, Doc.” Steve made a face. He was going to hear it for weeks at this rate. Bucky had been the one to press to call the doctor, no matter the expense they couldn’t afford. “What do you suggest?”

 

The doctor gave him a dry look. “The same thing I suggest every time you come to me with chest complaints, Steven Rogers. Hot liquids, aspirin as needed. Terpin.” He shrugged, “Rest and limited activity. I know it chaffs Mr. Rogers but it really is for your own health.”

 

“Thank you, Doc.” Bucky rose to lead the doctor to the door. “When can we expect your bill?”

 

The Doctor shrugged on his coat and balanced his case in his arms, “Next Monday begins the new billing cycle, but how about you come down on Friday during your lunch, Bucky? We can work out a payment then.”

 

Bucky nodded with a tired and fake smile and Steve burnt with the embarrassment that he’d been so sick for so long that this wasn’t so much a new bill as it was tacked onto the old tab. It made something hot and angry swell in his chest; something living he tried not to think about.

 

“One, two, three.” Muriel counted with her tongue sticking out between her lips. Concentrating on the movement of yarn, an awful color somewhere between green and brown, and probably the reason Mrs. Covey was willing to part with it, and the click-clack that her metal knitting needles made as the square-ish piece grew. “Look, Stevie!”

 

“I see it, sweetheart.” He said, leaning just a little to reach and kiss her head. He wouldn’t be able to touch it. Steel had more than enough iron in it to do Steve damage, and both metals left lingering traces that clung to items for days. If it stayed in the house, the scarf or dishrag, whatever the little girl was calling it at the moment, would have to be wash and cleansed before Steve could use it. “You’re doing a good job.”

 

They’d always been so careful with the girls. Bucky wasn’t fae enough to for it to do lasting damage, no matter the shape of his teeth or nails, but Steve was pretty sure that Mrs. Barnes had died in her hospital bed because of the steel scalpel they’d used to cut her open and save Muriel. Just enough fae and just enough iron that she hadn’t healed fast enough to save her.

 

Her and Bucky weren’t like Steve. Powerful enough for a trick or two, but diluted enough to only worry in passing about the steel and iron that surrounded them. Where Steve fought day in and day out to breathe with smog filling his lungs and burning with the presence of iron. Or the constant pressing knowledge that just living in the city weakened him. Just living around so much steel and iron made him waste away.

 

Steve wasn’t gone yet. Had no intention of doing anything less than fighting for it every day. Death might come for him, but it was going to have a hell of a fight on its hands that day.

 

“I’m gonna be out of work for a while, Buck.” Steve sighed as the other man settled next to him at the table.

 

“I know.” He pulled out the chess set that had been Steve’s grandfather’s year and years ago. Wiping down the table and setting up the pieces, white for Steve and black for Bucky, like always. “Don’t change much. We’ve got a little bit squirrelled away. It’ll offset the initial cost, and with the girls staying with Mrs. Covey we’ve got a little extra to add to it.”

 

“Gonna need to head to the chemist in the morning.” Steve [ **moved his pawn forward].** “I need fresh Terpin.”

 

“Aspirin?” Bucky **[countered the move, sacrificing a pawn to secure squares on Steve** **’s side of the board]**.

 

“Nah,” Steve moved his plan forward. “We’d just bought a bottle. But-”

 

Bucky jerked his head up from the chessboard at Steve’s uncharacteristic hesitation. “But, what?”

 

“Maybe you could go down to third? Pick up some rowan and sage?”

 

“For a cleansing? Or a paste?” Bucky shifted, and Steve reached across, maybe a little farther than he should, and pressed a hand to Bucky’s shoulder.

 

“Relax, Bucky. I’m not in much pain; the store’ll be closed now anyways. It’s Sunday.” He carefully shifted back to examine the board again. “I just thought it might help speed the healing. If you got enough I could make the paste and wash with it. Just to get as much off as possible.”

 

It was impossible to get it all off. Bucky and Steve already knew that. Too much iron dust in the air, too much in the walls and even the blankets and food; it turned the taste to ash in Steve’s mouth and cramped his stomach something awful. Sometimes, though, if Steve knew he was going to spend a day or two indoors and he’d been sick, sometimes it helped. Enough to get back on his feet just a little faster.

 

Or enough to ward off death just a little longer. Bucky draped it on his bed once, when Steve had been delirious with fever and coughing up blood. He didn’t know the whole story. Only that one of his Mamai’s friends had taken in the girls, and Sarah had sat at his bedside cleaning his mouth of blood while Bucky had taken a trip to harvest rowan and sage. Bringing it back fresh and powerful.

 

Steve had woken up to the plants woven into a rough mat resting over his blankets. It saved his life. Now it just might do it again. Or at the very least, his sanity.

 

The played for a few more minutes to the soft coo of Merida to her dolls playing house in a cardboard box and the clickity-clack of Muriel’s tenacious knitting needles. Trading squares and pieces of the chessboard. A knight took a rook on one side of the board, a pawn was knighted on the other. Pieces were captured until Steve could almost imagine the blood coating his fingers when he looked down and he had no more moves to make. Stalled.

 

“Damn,” Bucky swore softly. “Stalemate.”

 

Steve smiled and gave light laugh, “Want to play again?”

 

The other man huffed, “I don’t think we’ve won a match against one another in years.”

 

Steve raised a brow, “You want try something else? Still haven’t beat you in poker.”

 

“Poker ain’t half as fun if you’re not betting,” Bucky snorted. “We’ll play on tomorrow, maybe, I could bring home wafers.”

 

“We could play for chores?” Steve offered.

 

“With your health?” Bucky shook his head, “We’re better off with chess, even if we keep stalling.”

 

Then again, it was almost time for the radio stories. The Rogers-Barnes’ house enjoyed the mysteries and the best ones aired on Sundays. Guy Faulkner was a great narrator and the series the past few months were adapted from the Sherlock Holmes mysteries. Steve had borrowed a copy of the collection from Mr. Lothbrok on the first level. Steve liked talking to the other man, he’d been all over before settling in Brooklyn, and his book collection spanned several languages. Some days in the summer if the girls were out playing and Bucky was still at work and Steve, himself was out of commissions then he’d go and knock on the first floor apartment and ask to read another of the older man’s books.

 

Ragnor had never laughed even when Steve admitted that Bucky and he struggled with some of the words in the older classics. He just got a little quiet and sad. Next time he’d offered Steve a dictionary to go with the book. Not new. Steve probably wouldn’t have touched it if it’d been new, but a lightly used _Webster_ _’s_ that had hand written notes in the margins and stuffed full of the copy pages of _Oxford_ _’s English Dictionary_ between the pages until the book ballooned outward and couldn’t contain itself anymore.

 

Steve still hadn’t given it back yet. Bucky liked to lay on his stomach on the floor and page through just reading Ragnor’s notes. Their neighbor had quite the perspective.

 

They were interrupted, for the second night in a row, by a sound at the door. More knock and less pounding, so Steve wasn’t so concerned. But it was more company in two nights than they’d had the past week.

 

“Hey, Bucky.” It was James at the door again. Sling wrapped tight around slumped shoulders. “Mind if I come in?”

 

“Nah, be at home, James.”

 

“We were just gonna turn on the radio,” Steve smiled, “Wanna pull up a chair?”

 

“Guy Faulkner’s _Mysteries of the Mourning Estates?_ _”_ James shook his head, “I could never get into it. I came about-” Steve and Bucky waited, Merida and Muriel a quiet mess of noise in the other room getting ready for bed and pulling blankets and pillows off the bed to make a comfortable place in front of the radio.

 

“I need to tell you-” James swallowed and straightened then took a deep breath. “Mal and Beatrice are dead.”

 

Steve’s breath caught in his chest. That was never news that anyone wanted to carry with them. Beatrice was a careworn and sorrowful woman but around Mal she fairly lit up with happiness and contentment. They’d been saving and scrimping to get her out of the mob’s reach and it seems they both finally were.

 

“Oh, man, James,” Bucky stood to clasp the other man on his shoulder, “I’m sorry. They were good folks.”

 

“Was it-” Steve’s breath hitched, “was it complications? They were both beat pretty badly.”

 

James shook his head, “Mob, it was the mob, had to be. Found the pillow right next the Beatrice’s bed. Just sittin’ in pride of place on the guest chair. Pro’ly Big John Rossi did it himself.”

 

Steve stared, meeting Bucky’s shocked gaze across the room, “They were _smothered?!_ ”

 

“Had to be,” James said. “They were in bad shape when I left yesterday, but they were still alive. Nurse found ‘em dead in the morning. Night shift hadn’t checked on them _at all_.”

 

“I’m so sorry.” It was all Steve could say, inadequate though it was. Bucky had turned around, fist up to his mouth, and couldn’t say a thing. “We could-”

 

“No!” James spun, tearing away from Steve’s hand. “No, no more. I’m not losin’ anything else to those bastards. We’re- We’re leaving.”

 

Steve’s heart sank, “Leaving? You’re just giving up?”

 

“Giving up?” James croaked, and shook his head, “It’s not- not giving up to know when you’re beaten. And we’re beaten, Steve. Mal was- he was our dreamer. He was the one with all our plans and he died for them. You might be willing to do that, but I’m not. We’re leaving, me and my family. We’re gettin’ far enough away that Don Paulo Brancato won’t ever find us.”

 

He slipped an envelope out of his jacket, thick with what Steve was worried was all of James’s cash, and he shoved it at Bucky.

 

“What the fuck is this?” He rasped trying to shove it back, but James wouldn’t take it. He stepped away and let the envelop hang from Bucky’s fingers at the end of his extended arm.

 

“I ran a debt with you.” James said, “It’s all there. Didn’t want to leave ‘til you got it.”

 

“So, did I,” Bucky dropped it, “We were friends. I didn’t keep track.”

 

“I did,” James shrugged. “My mama did. My girl did. We weren’t the same kind, Bucky. We had to know.”

 

“I don’t care,” Bucky stepped forward, “take it back, use it to get yourself away. Hell, James, how’d you even get it?”

 

“Some of it was Mal’s and his girls.” The black man clenched his fingers in the edge of his cotton sling. “He gave it to me, in case the worst happened. Then it did.” He shook his head. “Keep it Buck. Take care of Stevie with it.”

 

Bucky didn’t let him just turn and walk out. Steve might have been stuck in the chair or the bed, but Buck wasn’t, and he went running out the apartment door. Chasing James down and Steve wasn’t sure even Bucky knew what he wanted from the other man.

 

The envelop laid on the bare floor between the kitchen table and the small nest of blankets the girls had made.

 

Girls who were even now staring with watery eyes where Steve slouched drained at the kitchen table. Merida clutched her doll in her arms, carefully climbing up to sit on the table without hurting Steve. Then she wrapped her arms around him and pulled him close. “It’s okay Stevie, you can cry. We won’t tell anyone.”

 

And Steve wrapped his arms around the small little girl who glowed in his heart, hugging her tight and let himself cry.

 

They missed Guy Faulkner that night. Pulled all the blankets back onto the one bed large bed in the Rogers-Barnes home and curled up tight. Didn’t mind that they missed the latest installment of the _Mysteries at the Mourning Estate_. They had two friends who weren’t ever going to hear it again, and they deserved to be missed.

 

***

The girl was beautiful, young and pretty like few things were in this retched time. Her skin was smooth, and her face was clean. No leftover sweat or makeup from the night before. She smelt slightly of lemon and Big John raised a hank of hair to his nose to breath in beautiful.

 

She trembled, stiff against the brick wall he had pinned her back to, trying so hard to be brave. To not make a sound. She didn’t know that he liked it when they cried, and liked it more when they begged.

 

“What’s your name, Sweet thing?” Big John asked against the skin of her throat.

 

“A-Amelia,” she whispered, trying not to tug but distracted by whatever was happening behind him. He could hear the restrained grunts and squeals as the other bitches from this block cooperated or _didn_ _’t_. It wouldn’t be pretty, but Big John didn’t care; wrapping his fists in her long blond hair he dragged her face up to meet his.

 

“And you’re one of mine, aren’t you?” He could see her eyes still staring behind him, so he shook her a little. Rattling her attention back into her head. “ _Aren_ _’t you?”_

 

“Y-yes, sir.” Those blue eyes were so wide and so scared. Big John wanted to carve them out and keep them in a jar so that look would stay with him forever. 

 

“Good girl.” He pet the side of her face, dragging his fingers against her cheek. “You’re going to do me a favor, doll. You’re going to run over to whatever hole in the ground those fairy freaks crawled into the other day and your gonna drag them out for me. You gonna go and tell them that Big John Rossi is waiting for them, same place as last time, and for every moment they waste my time, one of your friends is gonna get lead to the head.” He grips tight, pressing large fingers to the shape of her jaw and squeezing. It looks awful and he likes it. “Got it, doll?”

 

“G-got it.” She whispers, taking off when he finally lets her go.

 

He didn’t watch where she ran to. It wasn’t like he actually cared.

 

Oh, he picked this spot on purpose. The same place they’d challenged him days ago. The place where his reputation had been ruined. That was the important part. That his reputation, and place within the mob no longer be under suspicion. He was going to ruin them right here where they’d had the gall to challenge him.

 

And if they were smart and didn’t show up? Well, there were all these nice _cooperative_ young things who would cooperate right into an early grave if their friends didn’t show up. He’d count and kill tonight. Either the whores lined up like hanging meat on the sidewalk, or those foolish freaks. No matter what, his body count would rise tonight.

 

He couldn’t wait for the blood to start spilling, that was the best part. Big John might as well have bounced over to their holding pen, across the street from that no-good diner _Sal_ _’s_. Bastard wouldn’t let them stay.

 

It wouldn’t have bothered him, push the man around a little and everything changes, but there’d been a warning burn along the edge of his nerves when the owner’d told them they’d out stayed their welcome. Made him wonder if Brooklyn was even worth it, or if it was all full of freaks and damned. But the Don wanted Brooklyn, at least a little piece, and Big John was there to remind them that their owner was not pleased.

 

For now, he stood and swung his piece, a good old trusty tire iron that left his hands flaked in rust like dried blood, and watched women shiver in the later October night.

 

The night dimmed as a cloud passed in front of the full moon and a chill went down his spine, irritatingly.

 

“Hallowe’en,” one of the girls mummbled, “supposed to be off the street by this time.”

 

“Not like the Hunt’s gonna get you here,” Another girl replied, her face frowning as she shivered in place. Her skirt was too short to warm her and without hose, there was nothing to keep her warm.

 

Big John just liked that she was easy to access for his pleasure. For customers’ ease too.

 

There were, of course, already a couple of girls on the street. If they were smart they’d stay there and hope he forgot they existed. Not likely but they could hope.

 

“There they are boss.”

 

“The men of the hour, if you can call yourselves men.” Rossi turned and greeted his guest with a bloodthirsty grin. Looked like they’d lost some of their number. He’d have to hunt those few down later. “Nice to see you so eager to die at my hand.”

 

It was the tiny little freak who moved forward against, same as last time. “You killed Beatrice & Mal.”

 

“Of course, I did,” He swung his iron up onto his shoulder, looking for a flinch from the fairy he’d wielded it against so well last week. “They were going to leave.”

 

“Exactly,” Stevie weavie had big blue eyes so wide they looked like he was going to cry. Rossi snorted, no real men cried. “They would have left; turned away, been gone before you could go looking for them. Why wasn’t that enough?”

 

“Because they were going to leave,” Rossi repeated and hefted his iron. “Can’t have my little birds getting away all free, now can I?”

 

“But-”

 

“No, buts! Put your fists where your mouth is, freak!”

 

There was roar off to the side, from Barnes and Big John had to grin. It didn’t take much to best most in a fight. Wide and furious, or scared and timid, Big John had experience on his side and it let him keep a calm head when his blood was rushing and all he wanted to do was tear the challenger limb from limb.

 

Not that tearing Barnes to pieces was a problem, just messier than he figured **[the heir]** wanted.

 

Rossi ducked the punch aimed to his head. The one to his stomach and his side, too. He spun to swing the iron, positive he’d meet this asshole’s head and take him out one way or another just like he did the pipsqueak. Only-

 

Barnes wasn’t there. He’d ducked, which meant Rossi overreached and left the fairy too close to his body to dodge. And that freak used it good. Barnes wailed on him. Rossi was a tough son of a bitch, but that freak was stronger than he should’ve been for a man his size. And sure magic. But that shit was for messing with your mind and luring people into dark alleys and stealing their stuff; not to make them _stronger_.

 

Rossi stumbled back, trying to just get away from the thumping fists. He just needed a break. To catch his breath. But Barnes was like a beast, snarling and pushing. Not relenting at all just pushing him backward farther and farther until he slipped.

 

They’d reached the edge of the sidewalk. Rossi could hear the scramble of heels from the whores and his thugs in the background. He just couldn’t focus on it. Big John went down like a ton of bricks, landing off on the sidewalk and half in the street. And he could feel the instant that hard fists against his side turned into sharp claws in his stomach. There was searing awful tearing pain and Rossi could feel the gush of warm blood cover the front of his pants.

 

Rossi couldn’t believe it. That freak’d killed him.

 

***

“-ucky! Bucky!” Sound of Steve’s voice finally filtered through the muffled world he’d been driven toward. The feel of the enforcer’s flesh splitting under his fingers and the furious heat of _angerinvaderenemykill **ironuser.**_

****

He gulped down fresh air and refused to look at the ravaged mess of the enforcer’s stomach. Or the blood staining his hands. Instead he turned and faced the next threat to his small Clan, snarling.

 

“Brooklyn is **_ours_**! Paid in blood and death, ours and yours.” Bucky could feel the tension in the air, the brightening of moonlight that shown on the street like sunlight. He reached back and grabbed at Steve’s wrist. He couldn’t do this without Steve, he was the brave one, not Bucky.

 

“Brooklyn is **_ours_**.” Steve echoed. Gripping Bucky back as magic shivered in the air, “Paid in blood and death, ours and yours, South from Nineveh Street, North to 11th, East to the river, even the docks, and West to McMichael Street. What resides within is **_ours_** , belongs to us, and you don’t _belong here._ _”_

“Know that the only thing left for you here is death.” Bucky leaned down, not taking his eyes off the thugs and reached for the body of his first victim. Wasn’t quite sure what he needed, but something pulled at him, shimmered around him, asked for _proof_ of what he was saying.

 

Bucky grabbed Rossi’s heart, tore at the connections and offered it to the magic as proof and sacrifice. “This territory is ours.”

 

The nerves in his hands burnt as the heart offered to magic turned to dust as he held it. He didn’t dare to let it go. This was for more than him, a territory for Steve’s dreams. A place free from the mob.

 

The heart turned to dust and the light shown like it was noon with a flash of silver light, taking even the body at his feet. And the thugs that had followed Big John Rossi into their home turned and fled. His hand was empty and so was the street by the time Bucky could loosen the clenching muscles in his arm.

 

Most everyone had fled.

 

“So much for fighting friends,” Bucky snorted, letting Steve lead him across the street and up onto the sidewalk, then further. The world swimming in his sight.

 

“They’re just scared, Buck.” Steve promised, “It doesn’t mean much, but that was a bit more than most are prepared for when magic gets thrown in.”

 

“You wanted it though,” He slurred; like a world without reference, the only thing keeping him on his feet was Stevie leaned against his side like a guidepost. “I felt it. You wanted the territory.”

 

“Buck,” Stevie sighed, pushing him to sit down in a booth in a room that smelt like perogies and stew. “Just because I want something, doesn’t mean it should happen.”

 

Bucky snorted, “Just because I can’t see straight doesn’t mean I’m stupid, Stevie. That’s like that shit the nuns’ used to say; or the crap lines we try to feed the girls when they ask about Christmas presents. Anyone deserves what they want it’s you.”

 

Steve leaned his head against his shoulder, pressing barely harder than the jacket Bucky wore. “But how are we going to protect it? We’re just two people, Buck. And you _work_ for the mob. How are we going to keep things running without your work, let alone protect the entirety of Brooklyn?”

 

“You need a court.” Sal said thumping a tray onto the table and pressing a big metal cup of something sweet and mulled under his nose. “That’s a nasty case of magical shock you got goin’ on there, Barnes. Drink up and feel better.”

 

“Magical shock?” Stevie asked, “Not like the shock from killing someone?”

 

As his vision came back, and some sense of inhibitions too, Bucky could make out Sal, with a towel over his shoulder giving his friend a dry look. “Fae don’t tend to be that upset over deaths, especially the ones assholes bring on themselves. Magical shock though, it’s a little like getting drunk or high, the crash after is just as spectacular.”

 

“Already feel better,” Bucky offered his special cup in a toast, “thanks for that.”

 

“Well,” Sal gave a wicked grin, “have to take care of my kings, don’t I?”

 

Bucky shared a wide-eyed look with Steve, “I don’t know what you’re on, but we’re no kings.”

 

“You stood up to John Rossi, didn’t you?”

 

“Yes,” Steve said slowly.

 

“And you promised to help Malcolm Henley take care of his girl if they got out okay, didn’t you?”

 

“Anyone would have.” Bucky mumbled, not sure but not liking the direction this was going in. Especially the deadpan look Sal gave him, assurance that _anyone_ would most definitely _not._

 

“You started the ritual, even if you didn’t understand it.” Sal stood and cleaned up the collection of dishes. “You claimed it, you’re kings of it.”

 

“So,” Bucky offered as the strange man walked away. “You know anything about putting a court together?”

 

Steve snorted, “Pretty sure anything I know, you would know, too.”

 

“Well,” Bucky crossed his arms and laid his head down on the Formica tabletop. “Got any guesses?”

 

Before Steve could reply there was a loud crash from the front of the diner. The door had slammed against the booth that stuck out into the walkway. Ragnor, their downstairs neighbor, the one with the library large enough to include books in languages other than English, stood rumpled on the threshold of the diner. Bucky and Steve stared at the tall blond man as he stood in the door way and pulled on his jacket and vest, trying to straighten the wrinkles before moving forward into the diner.

 

“What do you think’s going on with Ragnor?” Bucky asked.

 

“I don’t know, but it looks like he’s headed our way.” Steve shifted closer to Bucky.

 

“I want in your court.” Ragnor shook his head, running a hand through blond spikes. “No, sorry. My wife needs your court. What do we have to do?”

 

“Umm,” Steve panicked.

 

“What makes you think we’re starting a court?” Bucky interrupted. If they did end up with a court it wasn’t like Steve wouldn’t be the one giving direction, god knows Bucky’s moral compass wasn’t in good enough shape for it, but it sounded like the other man needed some help.

 

Ragnor blinked before throwing a hand behind him, toward the stretch of street that should have been decorated with John Rossi’s cold body. “Pretty sure everybody felt that trick you pulled.”

 

Bucky ducked his head. Yeah, in his sane mind he’d probably never pull that shit off, but out of his mind it’d sounded like the perfect idea. “What do you suggest? ‘Cause honestly, Steve and me? We ain’t got a clue what makes a court work.”

 

“Uh,” their neighbor straightened in the other side of the booth, untucking his coat. “Right. So, Ann needs the strength of a court; I haven’t been able to sustain her in a while.”

 

“She’s fading?” Steve frowned, shifting in the booth. “Talk to us, how does a court support Ann?”

 

“Belief,” Ragnor said helplessly. “Promises made to the kings or queens of courts fuel belief in the court, which comes to the leader as power.” He shook his head and waved Sal over to order some coffee. “Power that can be channeled back into the court. That’s how the fairy courts worked, but when people stopped believing the courts started to ration power. Then they started starving the lower members. Ann broke from the court before it did more than hurt, and I found her not long after that. Found her and healed her and fell in love.

 

“For a while it was enough, my belief in her and our love was strong; but she’s started to weaken again. Couldn’t hardly leave the street before. Now I’m lucky if she can leave the house.”

 

“Okay,” Steve took control, which was only right. Bucky was happy to follow his lead. “Promises. What kind of promises?”

 

“I don’t know,” Ragnor admitted. “I’m not fae. Old enough to remember that the old agreements between fairies and humans must have fueled some of their magic, but, I’ve never been part of a court. I don’t know the types of promises they made.”

 

“Would Ann know?” Bucky interrupted. “She was in the court. She left the court, you’ve come to beg her acceptance in our court. Would she have an idea?”

 

“It’s not a good idea.” Ragnor admitted, “I’m desperate because she’s not well; her mind’s not all there anymore. I’m afraid if it goes on much longer than she won’t be the female I married.”

 

“I don’t,” Steve paused, searching for words. “I can’t make any promises, but I don’t want to see you hurt like that. Old courts probably made promises on servitude and protection-”

 

“Like the claiming.”

 

“Right,” Steve nodded, “But I’m not comfortable asking for that.”

 

“Or offering it,” Bucky added. They were two men against the world, and Bucky could admit he’d fight until his body was cold, dead, and buried for whatever Steve sought; but they were still only two people.

 

“You need to use something about identity.” Sal butt in. “Your claiming was based on _belonging_ , identity. You need to establish an identity. Because I can promise there are more than enough of our kind in this town to flood a court.”

 

“We need to think about this.” Steve muttered starting to slide out of his seat, unaware of the disappointment on their audience’s faces.

 

“No.” Bucky grabbed his wrist, keeping his friend close. “The mob’s not going to take John Rossi vanishing well. And Ann’s situation isn’t going to keep forever.” He smiled down at Steve, “and I know you, Stevie. You want to not only make the best decision, you want to make a perfect one. But that’s not going to happen here. All we can try to do is make a choice flexible enough to adapt later.”

 

Steve exhaled roughly. Rubbed his hands against his face and nodded, “Sal we could use some more coffee and if you could both give us some privacy that would be great.”

 

Ragnor nodded, determined and confident, but Bucky could see the kernel of doubt and worry lingering in his eyes. He reached out and tugged on the other man’s better made jacket.

 

“I promise.” He started with those dangerous words, ignoring the hypocritical groan from his best friend. “You’ll have an answer before we leave tonight.”

 

Ragnor just gave him a tight nod and moved so Steve could take his seat. Sal hovered for a minute as he topped up the mugs for the both of them, but they’d been serious about the privacy and waited for him to leave, admittedly by arching an eyebrow and shooing him away, before they started on the important stuff.

 

“So,” Bucky sipped his heavily sweetened coffee. Couldn’t afford sugar normally, but there was no extra charge for the sweet bowl on the table. “What are you thinking?”

 

“Why me?” Steve whined, “You were the one who claimed the territory, shouldn’t it be your choice?”

 

He wasn’t impressed, “Stevie, man, when have I ever done something that didn’t involve you from foundation to attic?” The other just huffed and Bucky frowned, “This isn’t like you Stevie. Normally you’d be all over this. The answer to all of your saving people problems.”

 

“I’m scared, Buck.” He lightly slid his mug from hand to hand. “This isn’t like giving Mr. Nan the medicine he needs so Mrs. Covey will watch the girls. Or even like raising the girls. You know as well as I do that the girls will leave us one day to have their own lives and adventures. This is permanent. Courts don’t just fall apart. We do this and everything changes.” He shrugged bone thin shoulders, “That’s- that’s terrifying is all.”

 

“Yeah,” Bucky looked for answers in the dark liquid inside his cup, but it didn’t have any answers. “You’re right, but none of it changes the situation. I- I screwed up. I claimed Brooklyn; brought magic into a situation we might have been able to talk our way out of, but…”

 

Steve disagreed, “It would have happened eventually.” He snorted, a smile eventually crossing his pale lips. “I can’t lie, remember? I know myself well enough to know that _something_ would have happened eventually. This just gives us more backup, right?”

 

“Right,” Bucky leaned back and made himself relax. “We knew stories about the old courts, but this is us, and it doesn’t have to be a fucking thing that we don’t agree with. Like Don Paulo’s organization, always trying to convince everybody that they’re a family; like a family can’t gossip and backstab each other easier than an out and out threat.”

 

Steve smiled quietly, “I want that. A family. A family of Kind. Together out of more than just the color of skin or the type of occupation. I want to build something that will last. Maybe even beyond us.”

 

Bucky sat back to listen to Stevie ramble. The bright light in his eyes better than anything. This was new, but it also wasn’t. He’d been following in Steve’s righteous footprints since the two of them were toddlers screaming and running across the hall between apartments. Bucky was more than willing to let Steve direct the next part of their life; he’d never regret it, for sure.

 

Later, Bucky and Steve walked home with Ragnor. It was late enough that the chill in the air clung to their bones and Steve shivered in his too large coat, but they stopped on the first floor of the apartment building and waited in the kitchenette as Ragnor woke and dressed his wife. And they sat on the Lothbrok-Morgaver’s kitchen chairs as Ann knelt frail and wild eyed at their feet with magic strong as mithril wrapping them together.

 

She promised loyalty, companionship, and support ‘from now until eternity ends in the Brooklyn Court’.

**Author's Note:**

> Don't forget to vote with your comments!


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